In a last-ditch bid to regain its gaming license, owners of the shuttered former Argosy Sioux City riverboat casino are asking the Iowa Supreme Court to hear their case against state regulators and the casino’s former partner.
A Sioux City Journal report says Belle of Sioux City, a subsidiary of Pennsylvania-based casino giant Penn National Gaming, has filed an application seeking a review from the high court of its claim that it was denied due process when the Iowa Racing and Gaming Commission declined to renew its license to operate on the Missouri River after its local non-profit partner, Missouri River Historical Development, signed on with rival Hard Rock Hotel & Casino Sioux City.
MRHD held the gaming license in conjunction with Argosy, but a contract dispute between the two led the commission in April 2013 to accept license applications for what would be the area’s first land-based casino. The license subsequently went to the MRHD-Hard Rock partnership.
Belle had sought to renew its license, but without a local partner the commission decided that state law required it to deny the application. In July 2014, the commission ordered Argosy to close. The following month, the $128 million Hard Rock Sioux City opened.
Belle appealed the closure in county court, but that went nowhere. Last month, the closure order was upheld again in a unanimous ruling by a three-judge panel of the Iowa Court of Appeals.
If the Supreme Court grants Belle’s application it would set a timetable for filing briefs. If the court denies it, the case would be over.
The Argosy riverboat has since been removed from the Sioux City waterfront and sold to an Illinois shipyard.
