Florida Says No to Bill
January
24, 2010
The Seminole Tribe and the state of Florida have come to yet another
impasse in their fight for gambling in the state. The legislature spent
a lot of time last year trying to come up with an agreement that
everyone could come to the table on but to no avail. The Seminoles are
set on getting their table games and their slot machines and as they
were already running them every day that the compact gets held up this
is more money for them. The state is going off of the law – but this
does not help them any in the negotiations.
The latest bill as to how much money they will give the state and what
games they are allowed to offer was killed in the legislature by a 17-0
vote. Under current law Blackjack is illegal, but the tribe is
continuing to run it. If they are unable to come to some sort of an
agreement fairly soon these games may have to go away until they can.
This means that although slot machines will still be present, table
games will not be.
This is where the online gambling community gets interested. The state
has asked for information regarding offering online gambling within
their borders. They say that online gambling might be a way for the
state to still offer table games if they are unable to come to a deal
with the Seminoles. If an agreement is not met soon, the National Indian
Gaming Commission will probably tell the tribe that they have to shut
down their table games until an agreement can be completed.
This means that the tribes would have slot machines and probably not
give the state anything for them, but the state would have the table
games through their online gambling. This means that the tribe would
lose money and the state would gain – although not as much as they may
have had they had a deal.
