The Quapaw Nation’s $350 million, 500,000-square-foot Saracen Casino Resort in Pine Bluff, Jefferson County, Arkansas is scheduled to open on June 26, but may open sooner. “We’re doing everything we can to beat that date,” said Tribal Chairman John Berrey, “and I anticipate we will.”
The property will include a 80,000-square-foot casino. Other amenities including a 13-story, 300-room hotel, a spa, restaurants, a conference center, an entertainment venue, and a museum and cultural center will open in early 2021, officials say. The completed gaming floor will offer 2,000 slot machines and 50 table games. Quapaw Nation Director of Construction Chris Roper said the project will provide 1,000 new permanent jobs when it’s finished.
In September, the tribe’s 15,000-square-foot Saracen Casino Annex and Q-Store opened across the street from the construction site. It offers 300 slot machines and a full bar and employs more than 250 people. According to the Arkansas Racing Commission, in the last four days of September, the annex took in $1.7 million in revenue and paid out $1.4 million in jackpots. It made a gross profit of $270,000 paid the state $35,000 in gaming taxes. In October and November, it took in $55 million and paid out $46.5 million in jackpots. It made a gross profit of $8 million and paid the state $1.2 million, Pine Bluff $200,000 and Jefferson County $82,000.
Saracen Casino Resort Project Manager Carlton Saffa said, “These numbers will skyrocket once the main casino is finished and opened up. When that happens, we’ll have seven times the number of machines that we have operating now.”
Berrey said the Oklahoma-based Quapaw Tribe considers Jefferson County its ancestral home. Saracen Casino Resort is named in honor of a Quapaw chief who was buried in Pine Bluff in the 1830s, he said. “Our relationship with Arkansas goes back to before the first non-Indians showed up and it continues through today. It’s not like we’re carpetbaggers. We’ve been there a long time,” Berrey said.
The Quapaw Tribe was the only developer to apply for the Jefferson County casino license, paying the $250,000 fee to the Arkansas Racing Commission on May 1, the first day applications were available.
The $350 million development on 3,435 acres will be the largest investment in tourism in the history of the state. Berrey noted, “The opening of the Annex and next summer’s opening of the Saracen Casino Resort will draw visitors from across Arkansas and surrounding states. As a result of this draw, we’ll see more businesses open and expand. These are aspects of a lively community, and we are happy to be a part of the renewal taking place here.”
