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KINGS MOUNTAIN — The South Carolina-based Catawba Indian Nation has received permission from the federal government to build a casino and resort on land over the border in North Carolina.
The U.S. Department of the Interior approved in writing Thursday the American Indian tribe’s request to use 16 acres (6.5 hectares) near Interstate 85 in Kings Mountain, just west of Charlotte. The location sits about 35 miles (56 kilometers) northwest of the Catawba reservation in upstate South Carolina.
The $273 million investment in the entertainment complex could generate over 1,600 construction jobs and create more than 3,000 direct and indirect jobs once built, according to an economic development evaluation of the project last month cited in the decision.
North Carolina Governor Roy Cooper has signed a casino revenue-sharing compact with the Catawba Indian Nation in connection with a soon-to-be-built casino facility in the state. The agreement now awaits the green light from the US Department of the Interior. The Catawba tweeted out the news of the January 22 agreement on Saturday. North Carolina’s governor has signed a revenue-sharing agreement with the Catawba Indian Nation that clears the way for Las Vegas-style gaming to be offered at a planned resort in Kings Mountain. The Cherokee casino is undergoing a $330 million expansion. With so much money at stake, he’s at the center of a feud with two other tribes, in part over the possibility of more casinos coming to. Latest Casino and Gambling News, Tribal Gaming, Employment & Careers, North Carolina The National Indian Gaming Commission is an independent federal agency that is responsible for regulating over 500 gaming organizations that are operated in the United States by close to 250 tribes.
The Catawba tribe has wanted for years to build a casino, which its leaders said has been thwarted by politicians despite a 1993 federal Catawba recognition law that was supposed to open the door for one.
The tribe “is very thankful for the department’s decision to take this land into trust, enabling us to achieve the promise of self-determination though economic development,” tribal Chief Bill Harris said in a news release.
Catawba leaders say they have a historical and legal claim to the land. But the Eastern Band of Cherokee in North Carolina, with two casinos located in the state’s mountains, disagree and say the Catawba should stay in their own state. The Eastern Band promised to fight the decision in court, The Charlotte Observer reported Friday.
“The federal government has no right or authority to create a new reservation for the Catawba Nation across state lines, into Cherokee historical territory, just to build a casino,” Chief Richard Sneed said in a statement.
The Interior Department’s approval came as North Carolina Sens. Richard Burr and Thom Tillis and South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham introduced a bill last year would have directed the agency to authorize gambling on the land. That bill had been idled, however.
Burr called the decision “the right call.”
“Congress always intended for the Catawba tribe to be able to take land into trust in North Carolina, where they have deep, historic ties,” Burr said in a written statement Friday. “I hope this decision will finally allow the Catawbas to move closer toward their goal of creating jobs and economic development in Kings Mountain with state and local support.”
The 38-page decision signed by Assistant Secretary Tara Sweeney says the the Catawba tribe has “both a tribal population and governmental presence in North Carolina where the site is located.”
The tribe provides health care, employment and other services in a multi-county, two-state area that includes 253 members living in North Carolina, the document said. “Though the site falls within an area where another tribe may assert aboriginal ties, that fact does not detract the Nation’s ties to the land,” Sweeney wrote.
Dozens of North Carolina legislators, Republican Senate leader Phil Berger among them — and Democratic North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper opposed the U.S. senators’ measure last year. State legislators called the bill an “unprecedented overreach,” while Cooper worried about whether it would prevent the Catawba from negotiating with the state. Such talks would include which games are allowed and whether North Carolina would receive a cut of the revenues.
Cooper’s office didn’t immediately respond Friday to an email seeking comment.
Harris said last year that his tribal members deserved the same prosperity as the Eastern Band has received from its casinos, the first of which opened in 1997. The Cherokee casinos have created jobs, state-of-the-art government services and payments of about $12,000 annually to each tribal member.
At a news conference Friday in Kings Mountain to discuss the 195,000 square-foot project, Harris said the casino would be paid for by unidentified investors. It would be run by Delaware North, which manages sports and entertainment venues in addition to casinos, the Observer reported.
“It’s a righting of a wrong,” Harris said of the federal government’s decision. “We have now regained what once belonged to us.”
Ron Fritz@ronfritzDecember 14th, 2020 - 04:17pm@ronfritzA Catawba Indian Nation casino planned for North Carolina had a ground-breaking ceremony in mid-July. It now has a tentative date for the first phase of the project.
The tribe, which is based in South Carolina, plans to build and open an “introductory facility” by next fall, according to the Charlotte Observer. Called the “Two Kings Casino Resort in Kings Mountain,” it’s a roughly $300 million, 60,000-square-foot facility located about 35 milies west of Charlotte in Cleveland County.
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Tribal Administrator Elizabeth Harris said the facility will have at least 1,300 slot machines, according to the story in The Observer.
The casino is being contested by the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians, which owns two casinos in western North Carolina and recently announced it has agreed to an amended compact with Gov. Roy Cooper to allow sports betting to move forward at its Harrah’s Cherokee casinos.
Although the North Carolina sports betting bill was passed in July 2019 by the General Assembly and signed into law by Cooper later that month, the process was delayed for more than a year while an amendment to the gaming compact was worked out between the state and the tribe. The coronavirus pandemic has been cited as one reason for the delay, according to a published report.
The law made in-person wagering legal at the Eastern Band of Cherokee casinos in Cherokee and Murphy. The compact still needs signatures from the governor, secretary of state and attorney general before being sent to the U.S. Department of the Interior’s Bureau of Indian Affairs and a 45-day public comment period needs to be advertised before it can go into effect, according to the Smoky Mountain News.
Kings Mountain Casino Progress
In March, the U.S. Interior department decided to put the Kings Mountain casino land in trust, allowing for the casino to be developed.
In late October, Cooper's administration received a proposal from the Catawbas on how it would run the casino, according to the Associated Press. The draft could become the basis for a gambling compact that lays out the games that would be offered and revenue the state would receive, the report said.
The Observer said Cooper and the tribe have had discussions about a compact.
Record-Breaking Fiscal 2019 for Indian Gaming
The National Indian Gaming Commission reported last week that tribal casinos had record high revenues in the 2019 fiscal year, with gross gaming revenue at an industry-record $34.6 billion. That was an increase of 2.5% over the $33.7 billion recorded in fiscal 2018.
That was possible because casino reporting for the 2019 fiscal year ended before the coronavirus pandemic forced every tribal gaming operation across the nation to temporarily close. The revenue was determined by 522 casinos submitting independently audited financial reports, comprised of 245 federally recognized tribes in 29 states.
Nearly every NIGC region experienced growth with the Oklahoma City region seeing the largest increase of 7.7%.
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sharetweetcopy linkLink copied!WRITTEN BY@ronfritz<p>Ron joined TopUSCasinos.com as assistant managing editor in 2019 after nearly 13 years at The Baltimore Sun, including 12 as sports editor. He previously was sports editor at The News Journal in Wilmington, Delaware, for nearly eight years after serving as a news editor there for four years. After graduating from Bowling Green State University in Ohio in 1988, Ron started his career at the York (Pennsylvania) Daily Record as a copy editor, then assistant sports editor.</p>... Read More<p>Ron joined TopUSCasinos.com as assistant managing editor in 2019 after nearly 13 years at The Baltimore Sun, including 12 as sports editor. He previously was sports editor at The News Journal in Wilmington, Delaware, for nearly eight years after serving as a news editor there for four years. After graduating from Bowling Green State University in Ohio in 1988, Ron started his career at the York (Pennsylvania) Daily Record as a copy editor, then assistant sports editor.</p>... Read MoreARTICLES YOU MAY LIKE
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