Schools Cash In On Tribal Gaming Profits Plummer-Worley School District, Tribal School Each Get $202,000
Wednesday’s bash at the Coeur d’Alene Bingo Casino celebrated winnings.
Big winnings.
But those receiving the two checks for $202,000 each didn’t gamble a dime. “These dollars for education are given to schools with no strings attached,” tribal Chairman Ernie Stensgar said.
Each year, the Coeur d’Alenes present checks to the Plummer-Worley School District and the tribal school, a 5 percent cut from annual profits generated by tribal gaming.
About 400 people gathered to eat prime rib and rally to keep casino doors open.
Gov. Phil Batt and state Attorney General Alan Lance recently stepped up efforts to shut down tribal gaming for good. Batt has asked the U.S. attorney’s office to enforce the ban on video pull-tab machines, said David High, Idaho’s deputy attorney general.
Tribes say it is their sovereign right to conduct gaming and that their video pull-tab machines are not much different from the Idaho lottery.
Leaders told students Wednesday that the only expectation placed on them in exchange for the gifts is that one day, the children would be the ones presenting the checks.
“There were a lot of tears,” tribal spokesman Bob Bostwick said.
The gift to the Worley-Plummer district will make up 5 percent of its budget, Superintendent Bob Singleton said. “We were tremendously pleased and astonished.”
The gift will save several district programs, he said, because the district no longer will receive consolidation funds - money given by the state to encourage small districts to merge. The Worley-Plummer district had received that money for seven years.
This year’s gifts almost triple those of last year. In 1996, the gifts were $75,000 each. In 1995, they were $25,000. The first gifts three years ago were just $3,000 each.
This year’s amounts were kept under wraps until the day of the ceremony.
“We said what we would do. Now, we’ll do what we said - keep our promise,” Stensgar said. “All children here are the beneficiaries, Indian or non-Indian.”
The tribe’s gaming compact, negotiated and signed in 1992, includes a provision calling for the sharing of profits with tribal and public schools. The requirement was insisted upon by the tribe.
“We have always maintained that our profits would be reinvested locally,” Stensgar said. “Our gaming has proved to be among the most important economic boons this region has ever seen. This is only the beginning.”
, DataTimes