Tribes expand with new casino ventures

Indian gaming emerges from the pandemic with ‘historic revenue’

From a guitar-shaped hotel on the Las Vegas Strip to a jazzed-up pit stop in the swampy Everglades and a new lakefront tower in North Dakota, tribes across the country are expanding their casinos and resorts after a slowdown caused by the pandemic.

There are reasons for all this activity. Billions of them.

Gaming revenue for 2022 was the highest in Indian gaming history with $40.9 billion, an increase of $1.9 billion that is about 5 percent higher than the historic 2021 numbers of $39 billion, according to a report released in July by the National Indian Gaming Commission.

“This historic revenue reflects the resiliency of many tribal gaming operations despite pandemic shutdowns, and that tribal gaming continues to rebound and remain strong,” commission Chairman E. Sequoyah Simermeyer, Coharie, said in a statement.

“Tribal governments and their licensed operations continue to explore new and innovative world-class experiences. Across Indian Country, tribes pursue economic sustainability through gaming by relying on the robust regulatory reputation for which Indian gaming is well known, and made better when supported by efficient and effective measures,” Simermeyer said.

Among the new developments is a planned second Guitar Hotel from the Seminole Tribe of Florida, set to open in 2025 on the Las Vegas Strip. The hotel, part of the Seminole’s Hard Rock International enterprises, will be almost 20 stories taller than the first one in Hollywood, Florida, near the tribe’s headquarters and reservation.

The Miccosukee Tribe of Indians of Florida is also planning an expansion to its pitstop gas station in an area known as Alligator Alley in Ochopee, Florida. The new addition, including a non-smoking casino with 150 slot machines and a space for entertainment, is set to open in November.

And the Mandan, Hidatsa and Arikara Nation is adding a seven-story hotel tower to its 4 Bears Casino & Lodge on the shores of Lake Sakakawea at New Town, North Dakota. The $95 million project includes demolition of the existing hotel.

The projects signal a positive outlook after COVID-19 caused a significant slowdown in gaming across Indian Country.

“We have cause to celebrate the opportunity successful Indian gaming operations affords tribes to invest in the future and improve the quality of life for individual Native people, and their families, and their communities,” according to a statement from Jeannie Hovland, Santee, vice chair of the Indian Gaming Commission.

Guitar Hotel goes to Vegas

The Seminole’s Hard Rock International unveiled plans for construction of what will be the second guitar-shaped hotel and one of the tallest buildings on the Las Vegas Strip.

Hard Rock International bought the operating rights to the aging Mirage Hotel and its outdoor volcano attraction last year, paying a whopping $1.075 billion for the operating assets. The tribe has entered into a long-term lease agreement for $90 million a year with VICI Properties Inc., the company that owns the real estate it sits on.

Speculation about the volcano’s future has erupted and flowed since the purchase was announced in December 2021. Plans now call for the volcano to be torn down to make room for the Guitar Hotel, with other renovations planned for the existing Mirage facility.

“We’re very respectful of the legacy of the volcano, but we recognize that is part of the Mirage of the past,” said Jim Allen, chairman of Hard Rock International and CEO of Seminole Gaming, during a formal presentation to the Nevada Gaming Commission on Dec. 7, 2022. “We will not be continuing to operate the volcano once we commence construction.”

The Las Vegas-based firm, Klai Juba Wald Architecture + Interiors, which designed the original guitar hotel in Florida, is designing the new hotel.

The hotel will be 600 feet high and feature 660 hotel suites, with 48,000 square feet of gaming area and 96,000 square feet of retail space with various restaurants, according to planning documents. Lasers will shoot from the roof and an LED show will pulsate on the façade.

Amenities will also include a pool, spa, fitness center and salon, developers said.

“We present you today not just a rebranding of the Mirage with a new sign and new carpet,” Allen said at the Nevada Gaming Commission meeting. “We anticipate spending billions of dollars and creating a new destination-resort on the Strip. We’re very proud it sits on the 50-yard line of the most economically productive street in America.”

It will be the second Hard Rock hotel in Vegas but the first for the Seminole Tribe. A previous Hard Rock Las Vegas opened in 1995 and was owned by Hard Rock founder Peter Morton and Harveys Lake Tahoe. The old Hard Rock Las Vegas is now Virgin Hotels Las Vegas. The Seminole Tribe has since bought the rights to the Hard Rock name.

The Mirage, one of the first mega-resorts, was opened in 1989 by casino mogul Steve Wynn, and featured tiger-tamer magicians Siegfried & Roy as headliners.

Longtime attractions at the property, Siegfried & Roy’s Secret Garden and Dolphin Habitat, have been closed ahead of the new construction, and the hotel is expected to close later this year for renovation.

Lakefront casino expansion

The Mandan, Hidatsa and Arikara Nation is adding a seven-story hotel tower to its 4 Bears Casino & Lodge on Lake Sakakawea at New Town, North Dakota.

The existing two-story, 18,000-square-foot hotel will be demolished. Plans call for an additional 108,000 square feet of new construction and 20,200 square feet of renovations. The facility will eventually have 264 rooms.

The original 4 Bears Motor Lodge opened in the 1970s with 40 rooms. A casino was added in 1993, with various expansions and upgrades over the years, including several restaurants, an event center, marina, RV park, water park, convenience store/car wash/liquor store and a River Willow gambling boat.

The new hotel tower will have 90 guest rooms, offices, meeting rooms, a sports bar, a steakhouse, and a ballroom on the seventh floor.

The addition also will include a new Sakakawea Spa, a gift shop, fitness room, and salon. The project will upgrade the entrance lobby, kitchen and elevator. The new development will support 200 full-time jobs, officials said.

“The 4 Bears casino is an integral part of our regional economy,” Three Affiliated Tribes Chairman Mark Fox said in a statement.

Demolition and site work have begun and the project is expected to be completed in the summer of 2025.

Joining the Seminole in real estate investing in Nevada, the Mandan, Hidatsa and Arikara Nation have spent more than $115 million on properties along the Las Vegas Strip in the past three years, The Las Vegas Review-Journal has reported.

The tribe’s acquisitions include part of the site of the deadliest mass shooting in U.S. history when more than 50 concert-goers were killed and more than 500 injured when a gunman began shooting from a nearby high-rise hotel. The 13.3-acre property was purchased for $93 million in 2022 with the tribe’s oil and gas revenue.

There are no current public plans for the properties, with options for developing a casino resort or flipping them up in the air.

For now, the tribes are focusing on their property closer to home and plan to use the real estate revenue for infrastructure for roads, housing, new schools, healthcare, and drug treatment facilities.

Alligator Alley casino to open

The small gas station at the Miccosukee Service Plaza along Interstate 75, at Exit 49 and Snake Road in Ochopee, Florida, was useful during hurricanes last year as a mid-way station for clean-up crews.

Miccosukee leaders and developers are now aiming higher after breaking ground on Aug. 16 on the new facility with slot machines and entertainment facilities.

The new facility will be the only pit stop/casino/gas station on Alligator Alley and is slated to open in November.

“We haven’t had an expansion in about two decades since the resort,” William “Popeye” Osceola, the Miccosukee Tribe’s secretary of the business council, said at the groundbreaking at the Ochopee service plaza.

“It’s important because we need room to grow as a community,” Osceola said. “We have community members living here but if we can show that this facility is working, then more people may come here. We don’t have a lot of room where we’re at and we’d like to grow. A tree doesn’t get bigger if you contain its roots.”

The Miccosukee Tribe of Indians of Florida started in the gaming industry with an Indian Bingo Hall in 1990 and later expanded to the Miccosukee Casino & Resort in 1999 in the Everglades, south of Miami.

Talbert Cypress, leader of the business council and tribal chairman, said the Miccosukee Tribe believes the casino addition will bring in more income.

“This is original reservation land, and we haven’t had the resources to build out here,” Cypress said. “We’re hoping this does that.”

Facing the competition

Other projects are also in the works.

The Forest County Potawatomi community, for example, which operates the Potawatomi Casino & Hotel in Wabeno, Wisconsin, is facing competition from a string of casinos set to open in downtown Chicago; Waukegan, Illinois; and Beloit, Wisconsin.

The tribe last year announced plans for a $100 million renovation that includes adding 1,800 slot machines, a new bar and restaurant and room for high-limit gamblers with a craft bar, a kitchen featuring a brick oven, and a stage for live performances, The Associated Press reported.