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County Beefs Up Casino Case |
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Tuesday, 27 November 2007 |
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Amador County has beefed up its challenge to the
casino development proposed by the Buena Vista Rancheria of Me-Wuk Indians.
The county has submitted new information to its case pending before a US
District Court Judge – the results of a study commissioned by the county and conducted by Stephan Beckham, an
American Indian scholar and history professor at Lewis and Clark College
in Portland, Oregon. The county claims that there
is no evidence that the Pope-Oliver family claiming tribal connections to the Buena Vista land ever operated as a tribe.
The county says this means the
property was never a Rancheria and should not qualify for a casino under the
Interior Department’s 2004 compact on Indian gaming. At this point, Amador County
has been waiting almost 2 years for a decision from US District Judge Richard
Roberts – if the judge won’t permit the pending case to be expanded to include the
new information, the county says it will file a separate lawsuit. The Buena
Vista Rancheria Band, headed by Rhonda Morningstar Pope, is proposing The Flying Cloud Casino on 67
acres on Coal Mine Rd
near Highway 88. The Las Vegas
style casino would include slot machines, gaming tables, a hotel, and a
parking structure for up to 4,000 cars. The county says the casino development
would create unacceptable increases in traffic, crime and demand for county
services.
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Last Updated ( Monday, 10 December 2007 )
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