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TRIBAL GAMBLE: THE SERIES

Day One, 12/10/00
Casino boom benefits non-Indians

The $800 million deal for outsiders at Mohegan Sun

Day Two, 12/11/00
Few tribes share in casino windfall

Gaming success helps tribe gain community acceptance

California tribes hit the jackpot with gaming vote

Day Three, 12/12/00
It's a war of genealogies

Lineage questions linger as gaming wealth grows

Tribes scramble to get into the game

Day Four, 12/13/00
Tribes make easy criminal targets

Trump plays both sides in casino bids

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Gaming success helps tribe gain community acceptance

ADELINE BOSWORTH'S SHARE of the Morongo tribe's gaming profits has been used to purchase a new sport utility vehicle and build a new home. (Globe Staff Photo / Evan Richman)

By Michael Rezendes, Globe Staff, 12/11/00

IVERSIDE COUNTY, Calif. -- After voters in March approved a state ballot measure legalizing Native American gambling, the Morongo Band of Mission Indians turned to the pumps at Morongo Shell and slashed gas prices to $1 a gallon for 24 hours.

"We wanted to say thanks to the communities that helped us keep our casino open," says Mary Ann Martin Andreas, the tribal chairwoman. "We've had tremendous support from the people here."

That wasn't always the case. Before 1983, when the Morongos opened one of the first Indian gambling halls in the West, impoverished tribal members often got the cold shoulder from neighboring non-Indians.

But today the Morongos are no longer impoverished. And their casino -- along with related businesses such as Morongo Shell, Coco's family-style restaurant, and an A&W root beer franchise -- employ more than 1,500 people, many of them non-Indians.

"People used to look down their noses at us but now everyone's real nice," says Thomas Lyons, the tribe's vice chairman.

While tribes throughout California are sparking citizen opposition with plans to build or expand dozens of Las Vegas-style casinos, the Morongos seem to have done most things right. And in an Indian gaming landscape replete with accusations of corruption and disputes over tribal legitimacy, the Morongos represent a model of success.

With their dependable support for local charities, tight cooperation with county sheriffs, and an ever-increasing pool of jobs, the Morongos are considered good neighbors.

Like other profitable gambling tribes, the Morongos' success is due in large part to a setting ideally suited for casino gaming. Astride Interstate 10, which runs between Los Angeles and Phoenix, the 1,000-member tribe is blessed with a steady stream of customers bringing in money from outside the area.

The interstate location also means the tribe hasn't had to ask county officials and taxpayers for road improvements and other services to accommodate growing casino traffic.

At the same time, the 32,000-acre Morongo reservation, situated in a desert pass between the San Gorgonio and San Jacinto mountains, is far enough from neighboring communities to avoid charges that patrons are altering an otherwise rural setting.

The Moronogos' enterprise has not been entirely free of controversey. In 1996, a group of non-Indian former managers of the tribe's casino pleaded guilty to federal charges of running an illegal gambling business -- which included skimming millions from the tribe.

But otherwise, the casino has allowed the Morongos to make remarkable progress, from a tribe once almost entirely dependent on government assistance to one that is not only economically self-sufficient but grappling with questions about how to invest its profits.

As is customary with Indian tribes, the Morongos do not release information about their finances. But over the last 20 years the reservation has been transformed from a desert outpost of a few dozen sunbaked homes to a paved oasis with its own water supply, cable TV service, and newly built tribal school and senior citizen center.

For 55-year-old tribal chairwoman Mary Ann Martin Andreas, who grew up in a two-room reservation house with seven brothers and sisters and their mother, the change has been dramatic. "We led a hand-to-mouth existence and now we're talking about investing a million here and a million there," she says.