A resident of Ridgecrest, California, has sued to prevent the city council and staff to discuss a casino the Timbisha Shoshone tribe would like to bring to the town.
The man, Mike Neel, filed suit April 5 along with an injunction to try to stop the casino negotiations. So far, the injunction has not been granted. Neel is opposed to what he refers to as “The multitudinous problems of casinos in small communities.”
Neel and other opponents have authored a 117-page document entitled “Ridgecrest, California Citizens against the Timbisha Shoshone Off-Reservation Casino Comprehensive Community Casino Report.”
Currently no meetings between the tribe and council are scheduled. There are plenty of supporters of the casino in the city, and one of them, Scott Miller, spoke at a council meeting to ask that the “city casino committee” not be chaired by an opponent of the casino.
The Daily Independent reported that Miller advised the council disband the current committee and empanel a new one: “so that we may have an open dialog with the tribe and council instead of having crazy rumors on social media? And in fact, re-do the committee, so it’s done in a fair and open and honest program?”
Mayor Peggy Breeden said several times that she favors having a casino committee. “I want the best casino project we can get,” she said.
One councilmember made the point that until the Secretary of the Interior rules on the request by the Timbisha Shoshone to put land off-the-reservation into trust that such discussions are premature. Said councilman Wallace Martin, “It is all premature until the secretary of the interior makes the decision to take the land into trust… the decision is in the hands of the gentleman in the Department of the Interior. Period.”
Recently representatives from the city met with officials of the Interior Department to provide information on the proposal.
