Gaming Compacts Approved by State Legislature without Worker Protections

In the face of overwhelming opposition from Labor, the California Legislature voted to approve four Indian Gaming compacts at the end of June that left an expected 100,000 low-wage casino workers with no real right to organize. The workers are particularly vulnerable, as they are not protected by most of the state and federal laws that cover all other workers. A union contract is the only way to ensure that they are treated with respect and can bargain for better wages and benefits.

The compacts, negotiated by Gov. Schwarzenegger and supported by Assembly Speaker Fabian Núñez and State Senate President Don Perata, represent the largest expansion of gambling in the country’s history. The deal would double the size of the $7 billion gaming industry in California by giving each of the five richest gaming tribes roughly twice the number of slots as the largest casinos on the Las Vegas Strip, adding 17,000 slot machines.

The state estimates that the compacts could generate $1 million a day for the state. But the deal leaves out the state’s poorest tribes, low-wage casino workers, and does not have adequate protections for California workers: No equal pay for women. No protections against discrimination.

The Governor’s deal doesn’t require that casinos honor card check recognition, pay a living wage or provide affordable health insurance. These multi-million dollar casinos rely on taxpayer-funded health plans like Healthy Families or Medi-Cal.

Legislators who voted for the compacts refused to fight for workers’ fundamental right to organize without interference from management through card check recognition, the California Labor Federation said in a statement decrying the vote.

“The right to organize is a fundamental right for working people and we worked hard to stop these compacts,” said California Labor Federation Executive Secretary-Treasurer Art Pulaski. In a show of solidarity, over 150 labor leaders—from international union presidents to local union leaders, central labor council and building trades council leaders—all signed on to a letter opposing the compacts. The casino workers rallied at the Capitol, including workers who were harassed and intimidated for trying to join a union at casinos whose compacts were up for a vote.

The Legislature didn’t listen to the workers. They ratified all four compacts without requiring that they offer any real protection for workers seeking to organize. Adding insult to injury, the Legislature refused to consider a gaming compact with the San Manuel tribe that Labor supported—where workers are protected by a contract with the Communications Workers of America.

The deal also ignores the will of California voters, who just two years ago rejected a similar gaming expansion proposal by a three to one margin.

Since gaining a monopoly on lucrative Las Vegas-style casinos in the late 1990s, Indian tribes quickly shot to the top of the list of top-ranked political spenders in California, contributing $215 million since 1998.

Another factor in the approval of the compacts was the possibility that the gaming tribes would fund a campaign to defeat the measure to extend term limits on the February 2008 ballot. Speaker Núñez’s term ends in 2008—unless the initiative passes.

Núñez had held up the expansion of Indian casino compacts that didn’t include protecting workers’ rights to organize, until recently.

Bay Area legislators voting for the compacts, and against the right to organize, include Senators Don Perata and Joe Simitian, as well as Assembly Members Jim Beall, Patty Berg, Joe Coto, Mary Hayashi, John Laird, Sally Lieber, Gene Mullin, and Alberto Torrico—all of whom were endorsed by labor in their election campaigns.

Voting with labor against the compacts were Senators Carole Migden and Leland Yee, along with Assembly Members Ira Ruskin, Mark Leno, Sandre Swanson, Loni Hancock, Jared Huffman, and Fiona Ma.

Under the law which established Tribal Gaming in California, tribes must share a portion of their revenues with local communities to address the impacts of gaming. The California Bureau of State Audits issued a report in early July which found that “local governments did not always use distribution fund money to mitigate casino impacts.”

The Auditor also warned that, “The ratification of compacts in June 2007, along with one that is awaiting ratification, may threaten the future viability of the distribution fund and the programs that depend on it, as they eliminate $92 million in payments to the fund beginning in fiscal year 2007-08. While we estimate that contributions to the State’s General Fund would also total at least $174 million, almost $40 million per year could be required to pay for the estimated shortfall in the Revenue Sharing Trust Fund.” See the full report online at www.bsa.ca.gov/reports/summary.php?id=540.