Casino San Diego Covid

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Last updated Dec. 14.

The uncontrollable spread of COVID-19 has made it very difficult for the US casino industry to function in most states. Across the country, casinos are limiting the number of customers on their floors or are closing their doors to casual and experts bettors in an effort to prevent the spread of the coronavirus.

Sycuan Casino Resort in San Diego County brought back the game in late August with measures that include sanitizing between sessions, spreading players out and limiting capacity. Last updated Dec. The uncontrollable spread of COVID-19 has made it very difficult for the US casino industry to function in most states. Across the country, casinos are limiting the number of customers on their floors or are closing their doors to casual and experts bettors in an effort to prevent the spread of the coronavirus.

Gavin Newsom on Friday appealed to a group of Native American tribes to reconsider plans to reopen their casinos in the coming days, warning that the coronavirus pandemic poses a continuing. To ensure social distancing, Grubbe said, capacity was limited to about 1,000 people in the 45,000-square-foot Rancho Mirage casino and 700 in the smaller Palm Springs one, about half of pre-COVID. Red Cross San Diego Imperial Counties + San Diego Blood Bank: are facing a critically low blood supply and are in need blood donations, plasma from recovered COVID-19 patients and donations. Additionally, the San Diego Blood Bank is looking for Blood Donor Advocate Volunteers to help maintain a clean, safe and healthy environment for blood.

Casinos were particularly hard hit in the spring, when most were forced to shutter. On March 19, the American Gaming Associationissued a release on the crisis. AGA President and CEO Bill Miller said:

With a spike of coronavirus cases in the fall of 2020, casinos are once again being forced to shut down in many states. Most casinos remain open in some respect, but that will likely change.

Though many gamblers will turn to horse betting, online casinos and online poker, our staff at PlayUSA wants to keep you up to date with a list of casino properties that have suspended operations in the wake of this global pandemic.

Alabama casinos

Wind Creek casinos in the state are open with some restrictions.

Arizona casinos

Most Arizona casinos are open subject to general COVID restrictions in the state. Twin Arrows Navajo Casino Resort is currently closed, and Casino del Sol closed for the rest of 2020 starting on Dec. 7.

Arkansas casinos

Arkansas casinos are open, with some restrictions.

Latest report on Arkansas casinos here.

California casinos

California is currently under a stay-at-home order and capacity restrictions in most regions. However, most California tribal casinos are currently open with a variety of restrictions that don’t always line up with state guidelines. More on that here.

Card rooms closed on Nov. 30 for three weeks

Colorado casinos

Casinos in Colorado mostly remain open, but some such as Ute Mountain Casino Hotel have opted to close temporarily. Table games are shut down in some other casinos. More on that at PlayColorado.

Connecticut casinos

The state’s two casinos, Mohegan Sun and Foxwoods Resort, are both open with restrictions. As of the week of Dec. 1, Foxwoods announced even further restrictions and temporary closing of some hotel areas.

Latest report on casinos in Connecticut here.

Delaware casinos

The three Delaware casinos are currently open with some restrictions

Delaware Park
Dover Downs
Harrington Casino and Raceway

Florida casinos

All of Florida’s casinos are currently open with varying restrictions.

Idaho casinos

Most Idaho casinos remain open.

Illinois casinos

All casinos in Illinois are closed as of Nov. 20 under an order from Gov. JB Pritzker. Visit PlayIllinois for more updates.

Indiana casinos

Indiana casinos mostly remain open, with some restrictions. Visit PlayIndiana for more updates.

Iowa casinos

All Iowa casinos are currently open, but with restrictions.

Kansas casinos

Kansas casinos remain open for now.

Kentucky racing

There are no casinos in Kentucky.

Louisiana casinos

Most Louisiana casinos remain open, but at limited capacity.

More information here on casinos in Louisiana.

Maine casinos

Maine casinos are open but must close earlier than usual. More on casinos in Maine here.

Maryland casinos

Maryland casinos are open, with restrictions. However, infections in Maryland via casinos have drawn some scrutiny.

Massachusetts casinos

Massachusetts’ three casinos — Plainridge Park, MGM Springfield, and Encore Boston Harbor — are all open, with restrictions. More from PlayMA here.

Michigan casinos

Michigan’s three commercial casinos are currently closed:

MGM Grand
Greektown Casino
MotorCity Casino

Some tribal casinos have also closed their doors for now.

Minnesota casinos

Poker San Diego

Native American tribes with casinos remain open for now, with restrictions. More here.

Mississippi casinos

All 26 of the state’s casinos remain open.

Missouri casinos

Missouri casinos are all open, with varying restrictions.

Montana casinos

Some of Montana’s tribal casinos are closed. There are restrictions that limit capacity in casinos in the state.

Nevada casinos

Casinos in the state and in Las Vegas remain largely open, but at reduced capacity. These include Palazzo, for example, where rooms are closed seven days a week but the casino floor remains open. More from PlayNevadahere and more on Las Vegas specifically can be found here.

New Hampshire casinos

There is no word yet on when casinos in New Hampshire will reopen.

New Jersey casinos

Atlantic City casinos continue to stay open, with restrictions. Of course, online casinos in New Jersey, are still running.

New Mexico casinos

Worsening conditions in New Mexico have led to almost all casinos being closed. More here.

New York casinos

All New York casinos, both commercial and tribal, remain open for now.

North Carolina casinos

The only two casinos in North Carolina, Harrah’s Cherokee Casino Resort and Harrah’s Cherokee Valley River Casino are currently open.

North Dakota casinos

Tribal casinos are generally open in North Dakota, although it is on a case by case basis.

Ohio casinos

Ohio casinos remain open, but are subject to a curfew.

Oklahoma casinos

Almost all Oklahoma casinos are currently open.

Oregon casinos

Most tribal casinos in Oregon remain open, with restrictions. Chinook Winds Casino in Lincoln City is one that has closed temporarily.

Pennsylvania casinos

PA casinos are temporarily closed for a three-week pause that began Dec. 12. Updates From PlayPennsylvania here.

Rhode Island casinos

The two Rhode Island casinos, Twin River Casino in Lincoln and Tiverton, closed for two weeks starting Nov. 30.

South Dakota casinos

Many South Dakota casinos have closed because of worsening COVID cases in the state, but a few remain open.

Texas casinos

Texas casinos are currently open.

Indian Casino San Diego

Washington casinos

The state’s tribal casinos all remain open with restrictions.

West Virginia casinos

All five of West Virginia’s casinos remain open, with restrictions.

Wisconsin casinos

Tribal casinos are open or closed on a case by case basis. More here.

Wyoming casinos

Wyoming casinos are currently closed.

LATEST UPDATES: Tracking COVID-19 Racial Justice

Friday, October 16, 2020

By Camille von Kaenel / inewsource, Jennifer Bowman / inewsource

Photo by Zoë Meyers / inewsource

Above: Two visitors wear face shields and masks while at a card table at the Sycuan Casino in East County, Aug. 14, 2020.

As many businesses remained under orders to stay closed during the coronavirus pandemic, tribes in San Diego County bucked recommendations from outside leaders and reopened their casinos with measures designed to limit the spread of illness.

It’s unclear if the gamble paid off.

Aired 10/16/20 on KPBS News

Listen to this story by Camille Von Kaenel of iNewsource.

Public health officials have confirmed that more than 300 of the county’s residents who contracted COVID-19 reported visiting a casino shortly before testing positive.

Casino Buffet San Diego

But the county won’t disclose whether any community outbreaks occurred at local casinos because they’re on tribal lands. The tribal governments have released little information and aren’t subject to federal and state disclosure laws as sovereign entities.

That means local outbreaks potentially are being left out of a metric the county considers in reopening decisions. Already, San Diego fails to stay under the threshold for outbreaks set by public health officials.

The casinos began reopening in May with new cleaning, social distancing and face covering policies, but some of their employees have raised concerns.

In late August, the federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration launched an investigation into Harrah’s Resort Southern California in Valley Center following a complaint. The case remains open and no further public details are available.

The casino also is involved in a lawsuit brought by its former general manager, who says he was so concerned about health risks from reopening that he had no choice but to quit.

Over the past two months, inewsource visited seven of the county’s nine tribal casinos. At each establishment, workers used handheld devices, thermal cameras or body scanners to check body temperatures of people entering the casinos.

Some casinos have disabled every other slot machine to enforce social distancing and have shut down some table games. Attendants at table games that remain open wear protective gear, and some casinos have installed plexiglass barriers.

Many, but not all, indoor restaurants and food courts have fully reopened. Guests are allowed to pull down their face coverings when drinking, eating or smoking.

Each business had varying levels of enforcement and open activities. Pala Casino Spa Resort in North County, for example, has reduced its transportation program but continues to bus in guests from throughout Southern California. Online it’s selling tickets to concerts.

Employees at three of the county’s casinos said the new protocols aren’t always followed. inewsource agreed not to name them because they feared losing their jobs.

Mask policies are difficult to enforce with guests, they said, and crowds can form around table games and slot machines despite social distancing efforts. Some said their management isn’t providing them any information about cases linked to their workplace.

One employee at the Sycuan Casino Resort in East County said she prays for her health before each shift.

“I cannot just let my job go because I’m scared,” she said. “I’m scared, but I’m there. I need the money. If I don’t have the job, I can’t afford my house. Then I’ll be living on the streets with my kids.”

With the exception of Sycuan, casino officials declined to comment for this story, did not respond or referred a reporter to safety policies posted online. In a May 8 letter to Gov. Gavin Newsom, county Supervisor Greg Cox and other officials, eight of the gaming tribes explained their decision to reopen, saying they believed they could ensure the well being of guests and employees and scale back if needed.

They also reminded the officials that the casinos are a “lifeline” for funding essential tribal government operations including police, fire, healthcare, education, housing and environmental protections.

Juggling economic, safety concerns

In mid-August, when an inewsource reporter was invited to tour Sycuan with a casino official, once-furloughed employees rehired as “safety agents” walked the floor reminding guests to cover their faces and provided a mask if they didn’t have one.

Most complied. One maskless woman waved the offer away and kept walking, despite prodding.

It was the first day of a new self-imposed rule requiring robust masks following research suggesting bandanas, gaiters and coverings with valves were less effective at limiting the spread of coronavirus respiratory droplets. The Barona, Viejas and Valley View casinos have adopted similar policies.

Eddie Ilko, Sycuan’s safety manager, said the mask policies have been a “learning curve” for guests and employees. He said the casino has worked with tribal regulatory officials and leaders to adapt as the pandemic continues.

Ilko said he feels safe on the casino floor because of the measures.

“We're safer because a lot of the history Indian Country has had, so we've had to be above and beyond whatever the local and state regulations are,” he said.

Some of the casinos have posted online that they are hiring. In their letter to Newsom and other officials about reopening, the casinos said they support “tens of thousands” of San Diegans economically.

Tribal casinos generated $4.4 billion in direct and indirect economic spending in Southern California in 2014, according to the latest available report from the California Nations Indian Gaming Association. They directly employed 24,100 people.

The casinos’ financial losses from the roughly two months they were closed when Newsom ordered businesses to shut down aren’t publicly known.

But in California, preliminary figures show employment by gambling industries dropped 41% in the state from March through August. Employment by Indian tribes, including at casinos they manage directly, dropped by 14% during the same period.

Since the casinos reopened, county public health officials say 112 employees and 196 patrons

with confirmed COVID-19 diagnoses visited a local casino within 14 days of their illness. The 308 cases are as of Oct. 5 and include three people who died.

Ninety-one of the cases have been reported since Sept. 1.

County public health officials stress that a person’s presence at a casino during the potential exposure period does not mean that’s where they got the virus. Officials also haven’t made any definitive connections between a casino employee and a patron, county spokesperson Sarah Sweeney said.

Whether any of the cases amounted to a community outbreak is unknown.

Throughout the county, public health officials have identified 47 community outbreaks in the past week, with 17 of them reported on Wednesday. Since March 25, the county has recorded 406 outbreaks.

The state defines an outbreak at a workplace as three or more probable or confirmed COVID-19 cases that are linked but from different households. Outbreaks are one of 13 metrics local public health officials consider when setting reopening policies, along with case rates, hospitalizations, contact tracing and other factors.

County officials have generally refused to name any specific business or location when identifying community outbreaks, instead providing a running total and grouping them into categories such as restaurants, grocery stores and private residences. The Voice of San Diego, KPBS and The San Diego Union-Tribune have sued for the information.

In addition to excluding outbreaks on tribal lands, the county also excludes those on military land.

Even without counting any community outbreaks at casinos, the county for months has exceeded the threshold local public health officials set. They have said they could take action if more than seven new outbreaks occur within a week, regardless of other state metrics.

Despite consistently failing to meet the outbreak metric, the county hasn’t scaled back reopening even as the number of community outbreaks spike. Officials instead are relying on what the state weighs in its criteria: case rate and test positivity.

Casino employees get few COVID-19 details

Casinos have varied in their decisions to share COVID-19 case numbers with workers.

Sycuan employees told inewsource they regularly receive reports about personnel who have tested positive and how many have recovered and returned to work. But employees at Harrah’s said they haven’t received any official communications and have only learned about possible cases through word of mouth or if a supervisor told them they had come into contact with someone who tested positive.

A Harrah’s worker said he spoke with his wife about how they would quarantine away from each other in case he contracted the virus after working a busy Labor Day weekend.

“It’s not the kind of thing where I feel like I’m in immediate danger, but I definitely feel like my health has been compromised,” he said.

Tribes are generally protective of their data, including during the pandemic, said Vanesscia Cresci, research and public health director at the California Rural Indian Health Board.

She said she knows tribal members in other areas of the country who have received racist backlash from surrounding communities after their COVID-19 cases were publicized.

“We don't publicly report it either because we are also very respectful of tribal sovereignty, and if they choose to report it that's up to them,” Cresci said.

In response to the pandemic, the county has signed memorandums of understanding with three of the region’s 17 tribal governments: Rincon Band of Luiseño Indians, Pala Band of Mission Indians and Viejas Band of Kumeyaay Indians.

The three tribes and the county agreed to share information about infectious diseases and outbreaks. The agreements also name a public health officer for each tribe, one of whom is a fire chief, another a risk management director and another a tribal chairman.

A county spokesperson said officials expect to finalize agreements with all of the tribes.

inewsource is an independent investigative journalism organization embedded in the KPBS newsroom. It is a nonprofit 501(c)3 supported by foundations, philanthropists and its own separate membership base.

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