In a little under two weeks the Hard Rock Casino in Hollywood, Florida will be offering around seventy gaming tables for its clients to play card games. Most will be for blackjack but baccarat and variations of poker will also be available, the first legal ‘banked’ card games in the state. Towards the end of this year the card games will also be offered at the Hard Rock Casino in Tampa.

Under a compact signed by Governor Charlie Crist in November, banked card games where players bet against the house will be allowed at the Seminole Tribe’s seven Florida casinos but at present only the two major casinos, the Hollywood and Tampa Hard Rock Casinos, have been selected by the Seminoles to provide gaming tables. However, some legislators and other casino operators have presented legal challenges to the Crist compact.

Florida House Speaker Marco Rubio and Senate President Ken Pruitt have gone to the state Supreme Court in an attempt to get the compact dissolved on the grounds that Crist did not have the authority to sign the agreement without first getting approval from the Legislature. Last week Isle of Capri, which operates the Isle Casino at Pompano Park, filed a lawsuit against Crist and US Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne. The company contends that the federal government cannot permit games in a state where those games are illegal off Indian land, and alleges that its operation will suffer irreparable damage if banked card games are sanctioned at the Seminole casinos.

The Broward County pari-mutuel slot machine businesses have not been the expected money-makers since opening, causing the Jai-Alai project in Dania to be put on indefinite hold by Boyd Gaming. With rising food and fuel prices adversely affecting gambling entertainment across America, the advent of card games at the more popular Seminole casinos is further bad news for other operators. Hollywood Casino plans to open its gaming tables on 22 June. (E-06.10.08)

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