Casino should get fair hearing
The Menominee Indian Tribe of Wisconsin took a very unusual step last week when it went after the very agency that will decide if it will be able to develop an $808 million casino and entertainment complex in Kenosha.
But the tribe does deserve a fair hearing into whether it should be able to open the casino at the site of the Dairyland Greyhound Park. The site must be put into federal trust, a requirement for the development of an Indian gaming facility.
Tribal chair Lisa Waukau wrote a letter to George Skibine, acting assistant secretary of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, saying that U.S. Department of Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne will respond to political pressure to issue a “hasty, arbitrary and capricious end-of-term disapproval of our long-pending application.”
The tribe now wants that decision to be delayed until the next administration takes office.
In the past, Kempthorne has made clear his opposition to off-reservation Indian gaming and his department already has rejected 11 applications to allow such projects and ceased review of another dozen.
The Menominee tribe said a rejection by the current administration would be based solely on Kempthorne’s personal opposition to off-reservation gaming “rather than any legal basis for denial.”
That is not right. The casino proposal should be judged on its own merits and applicable federal law.
Hear, hear.
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