New York demands arbitration to resolve Seneca casino impasse

New York’s governor has unleashed his lawyers in the hope of bringing a speedy end to the state’s casino dispute with the Seneca Nation of Indians.

On Thursday, attorneys acting under orders of Gov. Andrew Cuomo filed papers demanding a binding arbitration process to resolve the dispute with the tribe, which is withholding revenue-sharing payments based, at least in part, on its belief that the state has violated the terms of its gaming compact.

This spring, the Senecas began withholding the state’s 25% share of slot machine revenue from the tribe’s three upstate casinos. The tribe believes the December 31, 2016 expiry of the initial 14-year term of its compact entitles it to halt the payments. The tribe is also pissed that the state recently authorized three new commercial casino operations, including the del Lago Resort & Casino in Seneca county, which opened this February.

The state has rubbished the tribe’s concerns, and Cuomo recently threatened to authorize a new commercial casino in Niagara Falls to compete with the tribe’s most profitable casino if the tribe didn’t resume the payments, which amount to around $100m per year and are shared between the state and the casinos’ host communities.