"The conservation groups promising to turn out in force at public hearings that begin this week on the Warm Springs tribes' proposed casino in Cascade Locks are gambling with the very thing they most treasure -- the spectacular beauty of the Columbia Gorge.

Most of the arguments against the Cascade Locks casino are disingenuous. Some are outrageous, including the portrayal of the Warm Springs tribes as intruders coming to despoil the gorge. The tribes roamed the Columbia Gorge for thousands of years and still have strong treaty rights there. It is a perverse twisting of history to depict them as outsiders who have no business setting foot in the gorge.

Meanwhile, the Grand Ronde and other tribes trying to protect their own casino profits claim Cascade Locks would be Oregon's first off-reservation casino and set a dangerous precedent. Some have warned that if the Warm Springs tribes are allowed to build in Cascade Locks, they will be coming with a casino to a city near you.

In fact, only three of the nine tribal casinos now operating in Oregon sit on land that was inside reservation boundaries in 1988, when Congress approved the tribal gaming law. The casinos operated by the Grand Ronde, the Siletz and other tribes sit on sites that required acts of Congress to make them eligible for casinos. In fact, they were Oregon's first off-reservation casinos."

Get the Story:
Editorial: The big gamble in the gorge (The Oregonian 9/12)