 - The Wyoming Senate defeated a bill draft last month that would have included the Eastern Shoshone and Northern Arapaho Tribes in the state’s online sports wagering system.){kind=link}
(Cheyenne, WY) – The Wyoming Senate defeated a bill draft last month that would have included the Eastern Shoshone and Northern Arapaho Tribes in the state’s online sports wagering system.
Online sports wagering has been legal in Wyoming since 2021, when the Legislature passed a law authorizing and regulating the activity in the state.
However, that 2021 law defined a “qualified gaming entity” as an organization that offers online sports wagering in at least three jurisdictions in the United States – a qualification that the Eastern Shoshone and Northern Arapaho Tribes couldn’t meet.
“That automatically cut out the two tribes,” Wyoming Rep. Lloyd Larsen, R-Lander, told the House Travel, Recreation and Cultural Resources Committee last month. “We wanted (to) update that to make sure that they weren’t … being excluded.”
Larsen co-sponsored House Bill 299 – Online sports wagering amendments this year, and Wyoming Rep. Ivan Posey, D-Fort Washakie, was listed as the main sponsor of the legislation, which he called a “pretty simple bill” that “my constituents would like to see pass.”
Posey is an enrolled member of the Eastern Shoshone Tribe, which also referred to HB 299 in its online newsletter this month.
“This bill corrected the previous gaming bill from a couple of years ago (by giving) the tribes the ability to become a vendor operator for online sports wagering statewide,” the newsletter states. “This is a chance to get ahead, (as) many people may choose to bet through the tribe’s casino using its platform.”
Northern Arapaho Business Council Spokesman Travis McNiven said the Northern Arapaho Tribe supported HB 299 as well.
“It is really very, very simple what we’re trying to do here,” he told the House Travel Committee last month. “This bill adds (the tribes so) if they so chose … they could file with the state like any other operator to get the permits (for online) sports betting within the State of Wyoming.”
Expanding gaming?
During the House Travel Committee meeting, Wyoming Rep. Robert Wharff, R-Evanston, asked whether the tribes would use some of their online sports wagering revenues to help address problem gambling in the state if HB 299 passed.
“I want to respect (our) good sovereign neighbors; I want to allow them to do it,” Wharff said. “But I’m a little nervous that we’re allowing the activity to take place in the state, and I wonder if they’ve thought about any obligation that they would have (to) people outside of the reservation that might be having problems with addiction … based on online gaming.”
Wyoming Gaming Commission Executive Director Nicholas Larramendy said the tribes’ online sports wagering revenues would be subject to “the responsible gaming rules that we have promulgated for online sports wagering in that respect.”
Wyoming Sen. Darin Smith, R-Cheyenne, also expressed concern about allowing additional opportunities for gambling in the state when HB 299 was heard on the Senate Floor last month.
“Does this bill expand gaming in Wyoming?” Smith asked.
Wyoming Sen. Mike Gierau, D-Jackson, replied that the legislation does represent “an expansion – but a limited one (for) our tribes.”
“(It makes) the playing field level for the tribes, because up to now they have not been included in that,” Gierau explained.
Smith later voted against HB 299, which failed in a 12-12 tie and was indefinitely postponed.
Wyoming Sen. Ed Cooper, R-Ten Sleep, who district includes a portion of Fremont County, voted in favor of the legislation, and Wyoming Sens. Cale Case, R-Lander, and Tim Salazar, R-Riverton, weren’t present for the vote.
Interactive gaming
Another legislative proposal related to online gambling was indefinitely postponed this session after failing to make it out of the House Travel Committee.
House Bill 162 – Interactive gaming would have authorized online “poker, blackjack or any other card, slot or gambling game typically offered in a casino.”
Representatives from the Northern Arapaho and Eastern Shoshone Tribes spoke in opposition to the bill during the House Travel Committee meeting on HB 162, explaining that it could negatively impact their own gaming revenues.
“If it’s opened up across the state for Class 3 gaming, then I think that will cut our revenue down significantly,” Eastern Shoshone Business Council Member Clinton Glick said, adding, “We use a lot of this revenue (to) better our communities. … We try to utilize a lot of it for resiliency so that we could protect ourselves and make sure that our families and communities keep growing in a proper manner.”
Northern Arapaho Business Council Chairman Keenan Groesbeck said the Northern Arapaho Tribe uses its casino gaming revenues to support social services for tribal members, too – but those revenues have declined in recent years as Wyoming has allowed more gaming activity to take place outside of the reservation.
HB 162 would expand those statewide gaming opportunities even more, Groesbeck said, allowing “Wyoming residents to play the full gambit of Vegas-style casino games 24 hours a day, seven days a week from their home computer … without the creation of jobs or economic impact that traditional brick and mortar casinos create.”
The NAT’s casinos have “created hundreds of jobs and generated millions of dollars in economic impact” in Wyoming, Groesbeck said, while Glick shared that the Shoshone Rose Casino employs more than 120 Fremont County residents who “contribute over $15 million annually into the (local) economies.”
By contrast, Groesbeck said, the online gambling that HB 162 would authorize would likely benefit out-of-state operators who, “instead of investing in Wyoming, will be funneling profits and their money” elsewhere.
“Wyoming dollars need to stay in Wyoming,” Groesbeck said.
Glick agreed that the state should “keep gaming dollars local to Wyoming.”
“Interactive gaming does not help any of the local economies with employment and will send dollars to out-of-state entities,” he said. “That’s the portion that’s really hard to swallow. … I would rather have money stay within our boundaries of the State of Wyoming.”
Proponents of HB 162 said it would generate more revenue for Wyoming while also allowing state officials to regulate online gambling – which already takes place illegally in Wyoming.
Wharff argued, however, that the state should be able to address illegal online gambling without expanding gaming in Wyoming.
“We’re being asked to permit something that expands it (so we can) regulate it,” he said. “It makes no sense to me.”
The legislation was indefinitely postponed without a vote in the House Travel Committee, but the EST said it “may return in the next legislative session.”