Pueblo – The City Council ignored public protests Monday night and voted 5-1 to move forward with a planned $100 million casino on the city’s historic downtown riverwalk.
The council endorsed a letter of intent to negotiate an intergovernmental agreement with the Cheyenne and Arapaho Tribes of Oklahoma, which have proposed building the four- story casino, hotel and spa.
The letter goes to the Department of the Interior, which previously turned down the tribes’ plan to build a casino east of Denver.
“This isn’t over. We’re going to fight,” vowed Mary Highline, a real-estate agent who opposes the casino. “The feeling is strong that this is a city for families. They’re taking away our right to vote on this issue. It just means too much to us.”
More than 50 opponents of the plan, many wearing yellow T-shirts with the word “casino” with a red slash through it, asked the City Council to delay action on the issue and put it to a public vote.
The newly formed Citizen Action for a Prosperous Pueblo collected 2,000 signatures against the proposal in a week, said Hannah Rush, leader of the anti-casino group.
“You as elected officials are talking about changing the face of Pueblo forever,” Rush told City Council members.
Others who oppose the project said the city would give up the right to control the area if American Indians take over the land because any region they control becomes sovereign territory.
The tribes, which lived on land that is now part of Colorado until being moved to Oklahoma in the 1860s, said they would drop their claim on millions of acres across the state if a casino project proceeds.
Colorado Gov. Bill Owens, who opposes any expansion of gambling without a public vote, has accused the tribes of “city shopping” in trying to find a Colorado town that needs the economic development a casino and hotel would bring.
Pueblo has one of the highest unemployment rates in the state, about 7 percent.
“I think the more business that Pueblo can get, period, the better it can be,” said Jeff Rushing, 26, who works on Union Street near the riverwalk but did not attend the council meeting. “It probably wipes out people who have a gambling problem and makes it worse, but I cannot see that it would hurt this place more than help it.”
Despite the council’s support, Congress and the Interior Department would have to agree that the tribes have a legitimate historical claim to the potential site in Pueblo before the casino could be built.
“This matter will be resolved in Congress, and with the governor opposed to it and two senators opposed to it, I think it will fail,” said Jeff Chostner, the only council member to vote against the plan.
The Colorado Constitution requires a public vote before gambling can be expanded beyond its existing base in the cities of Black Hawk, Central City and Cripple Creek. An American Indian casino does not require a public vote, however, because of the sovereign nature of Indian land.
