It’s time for the Poarch Band of Creek Indians and the other interested parties in Alabama’s long and tortured gambling fight to change the game.
That was the opinion of Arthur Mothershed, the Executive Vice President of Business Development and Government Relations for Wind Creek Hospitality, which operates three electronic bingo casinos in Alabama. During an interview on the Alabama Politics This Week podcast, which is available Friday, Mothershed said it was imperative that the tribe spend more time throughout the year, and not just during the legislative session, informing lawmakers and others about the gaming issue and reminding them of the support among their constituents.
“I think too often we wait until the session starts and then we start working for this agenda or trying to push this agenda across the finish line,” Mothershed said.”I think we’ve got to do a better job of getting the voices of the people of Alabama heard.”
Gambling has become an increasingly popular issue among Alabama voters, and opposition to the state working out a comprehensive regulation and taxation package has steadily waned over the years. Polling of the issue over the last decade has consistently shown broad support among all voters for legalization, with even full casinos drawing positive polling numbers, and around 9 of 10 Alabamians supporting the right to vote on the issue.
Often, though, that support is overshadowed by the very vocal opposition that comes from a handful of key entities that push against any and all gambling legislation.
That opposition has shrewdly zeroed in on very specific portions of the gambling issue, such as pushing against table games or insisting that electronic bingo casinos are preferable to more traditional casinos. Some lawmakers — usually the ones who are looking for excuses to not back the legislation — then use those points to attack the legislation, picking it apart piece by piece until the bill fails outright or the clock runs out on the session.
That was the case in the most recent legislative session, where a handful of senators nitpicked relatively minor points and dug in over revenue distribution preferences. By the time those issues were settled and a bill that most people could live with — although not the best possible comprehensive bill — was approved, it was too late in the session to get it across the line.
To combat those tactics, Mothershed said the tribe and other interested parties have to do a better job getting their message out and show lawmakers that gambling is a popular issue in their districts. They also need to preemptively knock down some of the more popular anti-gaming talking points.
“We’re already in the process of setting up more polling before the summer even starts, putting together some focus groups so that we can get a better message to the legislators,” Mothershed said. “We’ve done some limited polling on (table games) in the past, but I don’t think we’ve done a good enough job in specific districts, where there are certain legislators that say, ‘hey, my district doesn’t support this,’ to give them information.
“They may believe that, you know, because I get it. You go to church on Sunday and you talk to some of those constituents, they may well say, ‘you know, I’m anti-gaming,’ or the pastor may preach against it. Certainly happens in my neck of the woods. But I think at the end of the day, the vast majority of people support gambling and support a revenue stream to fix some of Alabama’s financial woes.”
The failure to pass a comprehensive gaming bill has cost Alabama untold billions of tax dollars over the past several years, as state residents flock to neighboring states and online to gamble in a variety of ways, and it will cost the state and city of Birmingham hundreds of millions in the coming year. That’s because PCI recently completed a purchase of the Birmingham Race Course, and had a comprehensive gaming package passed the legislature this session, the tribe was planning a massive expansion at the site.
Mothershed and other tribal officials previously have said that they were planning a half-billion-dollar upgrade in Birmingham, should the state offer a full casino option, bringing in thousands of jobs and spending tens of millions on local workers and local suppliers for the construction.
In addition, the McGregor family, which owns VictoryLand in Shorter, has said similarly large expansion plans would happen at that site.
All told, Alabama was looking at creating more than 10,000 permanent jobs and generating hundreds of millions of dollars in economic impact simply by properly regulating and taxing an activity that’s already occurring around the state.
As it is, however, Mothershed said PCI plans to upgrade the facilities at the Birmingham Race Course, but not nearly to the same scale.
“Obviously, if a comprehensive bill had passed, we’d have been able to launch some pretty elaborate plans much more quickly than we’re going to be able to right now,” he said. “We’re certainly going to do things to make that a better experience for the customers. That may mean moving into a temporary facility that is more modern. That used to be a mecca, used to be a grand building. But I mentioned to somebody yesterday, I used to look a lot better when I was in my twenties. Age has a way of making all of us look a little different. But we still think that area deserves a better gaming experience. So we’ll do something temporary.
“That’s not to say if by some chance, a special session, or 2026, by some miracle, they decide to do something prior to an election cycle, that wouldn’t speed up our plans again. But if a comprehensive package had passed, we would have pretty quickly jumped into a full scale resort design and something that the area could be really, really proud of.”
During the lengthy interview on Alabama Politics This Week, Mothershed also touched on the tribe’s growth, the role religion now plays in the gaming debate and the jealousy that the tribe sometimes faces today.
