SACRAMENTO – Governor Edmund G. Brown Jr. today concurred with the Department of the Interior’s decisions to allow 40 acres in Yuba County to be placed in trust for the Estom Yumeka Maidu Tribe of the Enterprise Rancheria for the purpose of establishing a class III gaming facility and signed a tribal-state gaming compact between the State of California and the Tribe.
The compact includes provisions to protect employees and patrons as well as measures to protect the environment during the construction and operation of gaming facilities. It also funds programs in local communities to mitigate the effect of gaming activities and address gambling addiction
The compact allows the operation of 2,000 slot machines. The Tribe estimates that the project will create approximately 1,300 construction jobs and 1,900 jobs at the new facility. The compact requires regular audits of gaming operations and other enforcement and public safety measures.
A copy of the compact can be found here. The Governor’s letter to Secretary Kenneth L. Salazar concurring with the U.S. Department of Interior’s decision is copied below:
—
August 30, 2012
Kenneth L. Salazar, Secretary of the Interior
United States Department of the Interior
1849 C Street, N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20240
Re: Two-Part Determination-Estom Yumeka Maidu Tribe of the Enterprise Rancheria
Dear Secretary Salazar:
I concur with your determination to allow 40 acres in Yuba County to be placed in trust for the Estom Yumeka Maidu Tribe of the Enterprise Rancheria for the purpose of establishing a class III gaming facility. While I am reluctant to agree to the expansion of gaming on land currently ineligible for it, I concur in your determination in this case because of several unique considerations:
• The federal administrative process giving rise to your determination was extremely thorough. The process lasted more than ten years, included numerous hearings, considered hundreds of comments, and generated thousands of pages of administrative records.
• A large tribal population will directly benefit from the gaming facility. The Enterprise Tribe is made up of more than 800 native Californians who face serious economic hardship.
• Other tribes will indirectly benefit from the gaming facility. The Enterprise Tribe’s compact provides assistance to other tribes by requiring substantial contributions to the Revenue Sharing Trust Fund and the Tribal Nation Grant Fund.
• The ability of other tribes to benefit from tribal gaming will not be unduly harmed.
• The gaming facility has increasing public support, and it will create jobs and generate revenue for Yuba County, which currently has a 16% unemployment rate.
• The facility will be located within a sports-and-entertainment zone created by Yuba County, and the regional gaming market can support the project along with existing gaming facilities.
• The location of the gaming facility will not be within a major metropolitan area.
• The Enterprise Tribe has a significant historical connection with the land.
I expect there will be few requests from other tribes that will present the same kind of exceptional circumstances to support a similar expansion of tribal gaming land.
Sincerely,
Edmund G. Brown Jr.