Aces Casino Spokane Washington
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Spokane Valley businesses that offer card tables, pull tabs, bingo and other gaming will have some relief after the Spokane Valley City Council unanimously voted Tuesday to delay collecting gambling taxes until September.
City Councilwoman Pam Haley said she had heard from several businesses, including the Black Pearl, Broadway Truck Stop and Dave’s Bar and Grill, that are struggling to make ends meet while closed to the public or open only for take-out.
Haley said she hoped delaying gambling-tax collection, which would normally be due at the end of the month and at the end of July, to September and November would offer some businesses relief and a little bit more certainty.
“It’s just giving them a little grace period so they can get back on their feet,” she said.
The city collects between 2% and 6% of the gross receipts from punch boards, pull tabs, bingo, raffles and amusement- and card-game gambling. Spokane Valley anticipated receiving $366,000 in the 2020 budget.
According to a presentation to Spokane Valley City Council, city staff anticipates this revenue will be significantly less than they predicted when budgeting in 2019.
Deferring gambling taxes until September could be a boon for businesses like Aces Casino at Players & Spectators Event Center, which is one of more than 30 businesses or nonprofits in Spokane Valley that offers some sort of gambling with tables, pull tabs or raffles.
Karen DeMello, CEO of the corporation that owns the event center, said the casino usually makes most of its money in the winter months and she saves to get through the slower summer month. She said she started using her savings to pay for casino expenses months early due to Gov. Jay Inslee’s “Stay Home, Stay Healthy” order requiring nonessential businesses to shut down and people to self-isolate.
Between the casino and the event center, DeMello has had to lay off about 80 employees. She said waiting until September to pay her gambling taxes, which amount to about $36,000, will make her savings last longer while she waits to reopen.
She said paying the taxes now would also have made it extremely difficult to bring back her staff and buy food, as well as pay for other costs she might incur when trying to reopen to the public sometime this summer.
Businesses like Aces and the Black Pearl that rely on some form of gambling revenue, were mostly ineligible for the federal government’s Paycheck Protection Program, a section of economic stimulus legislation Congress passed in March to offer small businesses loans that can be forgiven if they keep their employees.
The Small Business Administration initially didn’t allow most businesses that receive a portion of their revenue from gambling to receive loans, but it loosened the restrictions Tuesday to include businesses that receive less than 50% of their revenue from gaming or make less than $1 million from gambling.
Heather Songer, public information officer for the Washington State Gambling Commission, said the gaming industry is facing “an existential crisis” and many of the business that rely on gaming revenues may not return once the economy is allowed to reopen. The Small Business Administration loans may help, but a large segment of businesses in the gaming industry will not fall within the new parameters.
DeMello believes that under the new rules, she may be eligible to receive a loan, though she has not tried to apply yet.
Before the change in the rules and the respite from gambling taxes, she was worried she would not be able to afford to reopen the casino and would have to operate Players & Spectators Event Center without it.
DeMello said she knows she and many other businesses dependent on some form of gambling revenue are likely considering whether they will be able to open once the stay-home order is lifted. She said waiting to pay taxes until after they can make money again is a good first step.
“To be honest, anything will help,” she said.
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