Several attendees at the recent National Indian Gaming Association conference in Phoenix recommended that other tribal leader look at the benefit tribes could reap from marijuana sales.
David Vialpando, chairman of the Santa Ysabel Gaming Commission told attendees that his San Diego county tribe didn’t have to invest much in its pots enterprise, but has already seen profits.
Vialpando opined that such sales may be more profitable than gaming.
The tribe leases the land on about ten acres, taxes medical dispensaries on the reservation and charge regulatory fees. The reservation has six cultivators, one testing lab and one distillation facility, none of them operated by tribal members. The licensed medical dispensaries are located off the reservation, he said.
Medical marijuana is legal in California, where the tribe is located. Vialpando said that whether such businesses can be viable on tribal land depends on the laws of the state surrounding the reservation.
Bill Sterud, chairman of the Puyallup Tribe in Washington said his tribe’s sales for recreational use have improved by the reservation’s economy but also the health of its members, especially that of elders and those who have painful illnesses in later life.
