Oklahoma is the third largest gambling market in the U.S. and the second largest tribal gaming market, with 116 tribal gaming facilities that generate a combined .5 billion in annual gaming revenue. Of the state’s 39 tribes, 33 operate gaming facilities.
According to Sheila Morago, executive director of the Oklahoma Indian Gaming Association, the state’s tribal gambling choices range from the second largest casino in the world, WinStar in Thackerville to mom-and-pop fuel stop-style operations. She said a few new casinos have opened in recent years but primarily operators are “reinvesting in and adding to their properties which I think is the sign of a maturing market. It’s not about putting more machines on the floor at this point.”
For example, Morago said, the Choctaw are putting in Gilley’s at a couple of their properties and Hard Rock is putting in Toby Keith’s. The $250 million expansion at the Muscogee (Creek) Nation’s River Spirit Casino in Tulsa will feature a Jimmy Buffett’s Margaritaville Casino and Restaurant, a 22-story, 500-room upscale hotel tower and a 2,500-seat branded theater, plus a world-class spa and convention and meeting center. The project will break ground this fall and be completed by 2016.
“Non-gaming amenities such as hotels, spas and golf courses also are being added to make facilities appeal to a wider variety of folks,” Morago noted.
Regarding games, Morago said, “Class II games are our bedrock here in Oklahoma. It’s what we built this industry on–Class II and bingo.” She said as long as the Class II market continues to offer innovations, it will remain strong. “We also see more entrants in the field. Who would have thought WMS, Bally and IGT would be creating new products for the Class II market?” Morago also noted Class II offers “something to fall back on if compact renegotiations ever go sideways.”
Also in Oklahoma, a Class III gaming compact is being closely watched by the state’s tribal gaming interests. The Cheyenne and Arapaho Tribes sued the Bureau of Indian Affairs for rejecting its compact with the state because it authorizes internet gambling. The state is not a part of the lawsuit but Governor Mary Fallin’s lead counsel said, “In the Governor’s view, the state Tribal Gaming Act of 2004 prescribing the terms of the Class III gaming compact between the tribes and the state fully authorizes the amended settlement and iGaming directed at the international market.”
Assistant Secretary Kevin Washburn, the head of the BIA, rejected the agreement, calling it “illusory.” He said the state failed to offer “meaningful concessions” to the tribe in exchange for a percentage of the online revenues. But Fallin said the agreement remains in effect in Oklahoma and allows the tribe and other financial institutions within the tribe’s jurisdictional area to process “international transactions.”
