The Barona Story
In 1991, Indian gaming was a fledgling industry in California with small, struggling operations. However, it offered a promise of hope for many Native American Tribes that had been economically challenged for decades. The Barona Band of Mission Indians had made a number of forays into gambling with a small bingo hall. They had potential, as the greater San Diego area boasted a population of close to 3 million, with the nearest non-Indian casino gambling well over 300 miles away. But they had suffered at the hands of outside investors and managers, and were at the point of voting as a Tribe to permanently bar gambling on the reservation.
VCAT and Barona were fortunate enough to find one another. The casino management, marketing and operational expertise of VCAT, together with the courage and faith of the Barona Tribe, created a rare and special synergy. Together, VCAT and Barona had a vision of the future at which casino gambling experts scoffed.
Barona suffered from the worst handicap a casino can have - a truly challenging location in the hills of East County San Diego. Its major competitors, Sycuan and Viejas, both benefited from close proximity to freeways. But through a combination of clever marketing, exceptional customer service and a true Las Vegas-style casino, the Barona Resort and Casino has defied skeptics to become the most successful resort and casino in California. It has also become a model of innovation, a trend-setter on the leading edge of technology that gaming manufacturers look to as a test-bed for new ideas.
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The Barona Timeline
Rollover events for more detail.
1987: Cabazon Supreme Court decision
As gambling expanded on reservations across the US, dissonance between state governments and Tribal governments expanded as well. California believed that high-stakes bingo and poker games on Indian lands violated state law, and tried to close the Cabazon Band's games. Cabazon sought out Don's assistance in both operating the card room through a management agreement and funding the legal costs. In the ensuing court case, California wanted the Supreme Court to recognize state authority to regulate gambling on reservations. The Cabazon Band of Mission Indians argued that its status as a sovereign government prevented the state from interfering in its affairs.
The case centered around Public Law 280, a federal statute that gave states broad criminal jurisdiction but only limited civil jurisdiction. The Supreme Court ruled that public policy should determine the state's jurisdiction regarding gambling - if the state permitted gambling in general (lotteries, charity gambling), then the state had no authority to regulate gambling on Indian lands. This dramatic interpretation opened the door wide to Indian gaming.
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1988: The Indian Gambling Regulatory Act (IGRA)
IGRA was passed largely in response to the Cabazon decision. It defined three classes of gaming:
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Class I: |
Traditional tribal gaming and social gaming for minimal prizes. |
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Class II: |
Bingo, pull tabs and similar games, plus non-house-banked games like poker. |
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Class III: |
All forms of gambling that are not Class I or Class II. |
IGRA largely left the conduct and regulation of Class I and Class II gaming to Tribes, provided that it didn't conflict with public policy in their state. To conduct Class III gaming, Tribes were required to negotiate compacts with their respective states (subject to approval of the Secretary of the Interior).
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1991: Barona Casino (poker)
In the wake of IGRA and other activities that were about to spawn giant gaming industries, VCAT established a relationship with the Barona Band of Mission Indians. Don Speer, founder and Chairman of VCAT, realized that IGRA provided a business opportunity that had the potential to provide long-term financial independence for Indian tribes. The language of IGRA permitted Indian tribes to conduct games like hold 'em and stud poker, Pai Gow Poker and Super Pan 9, since they were permitted in massive card clubs like the Commerce Casino and the Bicycle Casino. He had done something similar for the Cabazon Tribe prior to the Cabazon Decision, and believed that Barona could achieve similar success. Don provided the investment capital and entered into a management contract with the Tribe, and developed a luxurious card room with great food and service. The seeds that would later become the most successful casino in California were planted.
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1992: Joker's Wild 21
Around this time, Don also came up with a unique gaming concept called Joker's Wild 21, and implemented it with the input of Barona's attorney. The game operated very much like blackjack (which was not permitted under IGRA), but Joker's Wild 21 was a Class II game and was therefore legal. This game, combined with the other gaming offerings at Barona, allowed the fledgling casino to begin to realize its potential.
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1993: Pull-tab dispensers and electronic pull-tab machines
Barona sold pull-tabs, which are very similar to scratch-off lottery tickets. The player buys a ticket, pops open a few perforated windows to reveal some symbols, and then compares the symbols to a chart of winning combinations.
Around this time, a Barona tribal elder told Don about a machine that used pull tabs, simulating a slot machine experience but fully complied with IGRA. The machine dispensed pull-tabs, which contained bar codes that were read as the ticket came out. The machine would then display a slot machine-like result on its video screen, so it felt like a slot machine but complied with IGRA and various court decisions. And all of a sudden, Barona went from a money-losing casino to a success story.
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1994: The Big Top
As a result of these successes, Barona was one of the three Indian gaming success stories in Southern California. But it was third of three, and Don knew that anything he did to expand the casino would immediately be met by similar or larger expansion by Sycuan and Viejas. So he embarked on an ambitious project to build a massive, turn-of-the-century circus-themed casino - in secret, not giving Barona's competitors a way to respond quickly.
To do so, Don and the Tribe settled on using a Sprung structure, the first casino to do so. This allowed the 'construction' to happen almost overnight. Don recruited a world-class designer with extensive circus experience. The result was a truly unique casino experience, under a Big Top.
When the Big Top opened in January of 1994, it housed over 1,000 machines, making it the largest casino in California at the time. It was an immediate, massive success. The Big Top put Barona so far out in front of its competitors that only a seismic change could dislodge it.
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1998: Pala Compact
In order to head off accusations of bad faith, then-governor of California Pete Wilson entered into a compact with the Pala Band of Mission Indians, a non-gaming tribe in northern San Diego County. Barona also entered into this compact which allowed the Tribe to test slot-style machines that were based on scratchers. The machines were a wild success and were also the beginning of ticket-in-ticket-out.
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1999: 1999 Compact
In August 1999, Barona and tribes throughout the state entered into current compacts with the State of California.
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2000: Proposition 1A
It was determined that the Constitution would have to be amended to allow the state to negotiate these compacts as required by IGRA without a constitutional violation. Proposition 1A was approved by California voters in a landslide, passing with 65% of the vote.
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2000: Ticket-In Ticket-Out
Barona Valley Resort and Casino has, from the date of its first compact with California, positioned itself as a leader in innovation in all areas of operation. Perhaps the most obvious of these is the Casino's development and installation of Ticket-In Ticket-Out (TITO) technology in 2000, long before this technology was widely accepted in the casino industry. Barona was the first casino in the world to build and implement a TITO system. All of Barona's 1,057 machines operated without coins, and as a result of Prop 1A and the compact with the State of California, Barona installed 2,000 entirely new TITO machines.
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2003: Barona Valley Ranch
In 2003, the Barona Tribe opened the Barona Valley Ranch Resort and Casino, a stunningly beautiful resort with 400 luxury hotel rooms, 2000 slot and video poker machines and over fifty table games. In all, the Barona Resort and Casino now comprises over 1.6 million square feet, including one of the top-ranked golf courses in the US, as well as award-winning restaurants and a spa. Barona Valley Resort and Casino has the distinction of being the most award-winning casino resort in the world, having received awards for the casino, casino marketing, public relations, the Barona Players' Club, customer service, technology, golf course, food, water conservation and the environment. The dream that had begun more than 20 years before with a small poker room had blossomed into one of the world's finest resorts, and established the Barona Tribe as a leader not just in Tribal gaming, but in the gaming industry at large.
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