The National Indian Gaming Association has partnered with consultancy Blue Stone Strategy Group to author a comprehensive guide to 21st century tribal economic development. Called “Defining the Next Era in Tribal Economic Development: The Diversification Imperative for Tribal Economic Development,” the project, initiated by NIGA Chairman Ernie Stevens Jr., blends theory, vignettes from tribes and research from throughout Indian Country with input from dozens of tribal leaders.
Stevens said the work is in part an homage to his father, Native American leader, historian and educator Ernie Stevens Sr. “The book is part of my—I don’t want to say legacy, but it’s part of my responsibility to my dad, and it’s a way to go beyond my responsibility as chairman of NIGA where I’m supporting and protecting the gaming industry. That’s a large part of my job, but also I believe it’s important to look beyond gaming. That’s kind of the path my father handed me.”
Defining the Next Era looks beyond the gaming industry, but acknowledges Indian gaming as the foundation and driving force behind diversifying and growing tribal economies across Indian country. “Gaming is to be intertwined all throughout (the guide),” the project outline says.
The guide’s introduction, written by Stevens, has an overall theme reflecting an “American Success Story.”
“What we’re trying to do now is not much different than what my father and his colleagues were doing then, except for we have a $28 billion industry and we have economic development that’s a little more fluid than in his day,” Stevens wrote, “but we still have something that they had then—a lot of tribes and a lot of people looking for jobs.
“So the challenge is, how do we continue to utilize Indian gaming and economic development to build our economies? It can’t always be just gaming. The bottom line is strategizing and working together and sharing ideas to keep our economies strong, and the No. 2 priority is to work as hard as we can to champion our economies within and beyond gaming.”
The guide sees the $28 billion Indian gaming business as a mature industry that will continue to generate revenues, but will not experience the huge growth spurts of its early years in the 1990s and first few years of the 2000s. That’s why tribes need to look beyond gaming for growth in the 21st century, Blue Stone Executive Director John Mooers told the Indian Country Today Media Network.
“The guide is meant to be a practitioners’ guide, and will focus on real examples throughout Indian Country and ready-to-use solutions with tangible frameworks leaders can utilize from day one as opposed to a comprehensive study, survey, or white paper for academia or policymakers,” Mooers said.
The guide provides dozens of examples of successful diversification strategies, including policy changes, if needed, so tribes can own their own gaming machines, which is seen as a necessary step.
Examples cited by the Indian Country Today network include expanding into new markets with existing capabilities or into new capabilities into the same market, with methods like his extending resort management and hospitality skill sets into elective healthcare services, making investments off reservation in similar businesses to current enterprise, or starting a banking or credit union enterprise; and exporting internal functions to other tribes and nearby communities.
