Letter: Native Village of Eklutna is acting within its rights on gaming hall

At YWCA Alaska, we are on a mission to empower women, eliminate racism and ensure peace, justice, freedom and dignity for all.

We have watched with dismay as the discussion around the Native Village of Eklutna’s gaming hall has escalated to levels of fervor incongruous with the issue at hand. The facts are readily available to the public. The Native Village of Eklutna, acting completely within its rights as a sovereign tribal nation, is seeking to open a facility providing “Class II games” such as bingo or lotto. The Indian Gaming Regulatory Act (IGRA) allows for tribes to conduct these games if they are already allowed by state law. A quick drive through Anchorage will reveal no shortage of bingo halls. The tribe is seeking to use proceeds from the facility to fund tribal operations, provide for the general welfare of tribal members, promote economic development, donate to charitable organizations or fund municipal government, consistent with the uses allowed in the IGRA.

We find it interesting that opposition to this facility includes area residents who are worried that the facility would “harm the rural character” of the community. We wonder if they ever considered what harm has come to the “rural character” of the tribe’s original lands and waters since the arrival of Captain Cook. This same group of people is suing the tribe, challenging the right of tribes to exist in Alaska at all. This deeply racially charged motivation for opposing a bingo hall is abhorrent and we condemn it in the strongest possible terms. We also wonder if those opposed for other, perhaps more rational reasons really wish to be allies with such a racist legal action. While gambling addiction is a real concern in a general sense, if it were truly an issue in this particular case, those wringing their hands should be working first to address existing bingo halls and pull-tab operators. If these people are opposed to Eklutna’s facility while ignoring all the organizations already in business, we can only surmise that they are not opposed so much as to what is being proposed, as they are to who is proposing it.

We appreciate the support of this project by Mayor Suzanne Lafrance and Assembly Chair Chris Constant. That our municipal leaders have chosen to be an ally to the tribe in their fight to exercise their constitutional rights to tribal sovereignty is encouraging and we hope it leads to deeper, mutually beneficial, ties between the municipality and tribe.

— Jessie Lavoie, CEO, YWCA Alaska

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