Indian gambling officials on Thursday told a House panel that tribal casino
regulations should be controlled by agreements between tribes and states,
not the federal government. Last month, the Senate Indian Affairs Committee
passed a bill by Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., that would authorize a federal
agency — the National Indian Gaming Commission — to regulate tribal
casinos. Rep. Richard Pombo, R-Calif., chairman of the House Resources
Committee, is working on his own Indian gaming bill but has not decided
whether to expand federal regulation. McCain’s bill would override a federal
judge’s ruling in August 2005, saying the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act of
1988 does not empower the National Indian Gaming Commission to regulate
tribal casinos.

Phil Hogen, chairman of the National Indian Gaming Commission, said the 1988
law needs to be clarified so the commission can do its job.

“We are finding the door slammed in our face,” Hogen told the House
Resources Committee. “We sent two of our investigators … out to Western
Montana this week and when they got there, they were denied access (to an
Indian casino), and the tribe pointed to the ruling … to keep us out.”

But Franklin Ducheneaux, a member of the Minnesota Indian Gaming Association
and a former counsel to the late Rep. Morris Udall, D-Ariz., who helped
craft the 1988 law, said Congress did not intend to authorize federal
regulation of tribal casinos.

The law limited federal regulation to bingo and other tribal operations less
sophisticated than casinos to preserve tribal sovereignty, Ducheneaux said.

When the National Indian Gaming Commission began imposing minimum auditing
and internal control standards on tribal casinos in 1999, Indian gaming
officials argued this was a violation of the 1988 law.

The friction led to last year’s ruling in favor of the Colorado River Indian
Tribes of Arizona which challenged the National Indian Gaming Commission’s
minimum internal control standards for its casino.

“If Congress believes it is necessary for the (Indian Gaming Regulatory Act)
to address the (minimum internal control standards), it should do so in a
way that is deferential to the regulatory scheme negotiated between tribes
and states in their compacts,’ said Raymond Aspa, a member of the tribal
council of the Colorado Indian River Tribes.

Ernie Stevens Jr., chairman of the National Indian Gaming Association, said
tribes spent $320 million last year on regulation and employ more than 2,800
regulators.

Norman DesRosiers, a commissioner for the Viejas Tribal Gaming Commission in
Alpine, Calif., said tribes that comply with minimum internal control
standards for three years should be eligible for a certificate of
“self-regulation.”

Kevin Washburn, a law professor at the University of Minnesota, said state
regulation of Indian gambling has been “spotty,” and the industry has become
so important to tribes that it must be protected.

“That’s largely why I think the federal government should have this
(regulatory) role,” Washburn said.