Sonoma County Board of Supervisors to vote on resolution opposing Koi Nation’s casino

The Sonoma County Board of Supervisors is set to vote on a resolution that both opposes the Koi Nation’s proposed casino and resort outside Windsor and questions the tribe’s historical ties to Sonoma County.

The vote, scheduled for Tuesday, comes after five federally recognized Sonoma County tribes wrote to the board urging supervisors to pass a resolution opposing the Koi Nation’s $600 million planned project.

It would be the third Las Vegas-style tribal gambling destination in Sonoma County.

Letters from the opposing tribes, including two who own competing casinos, argue that the Koi Nation’s roots are in the Lower Lake area of Lake County and that allowing a tribe to establish a casino in Sonoma County would violate federal law.

“Koi Nation's attempts to manufacture a connection to Sonoma County are an affront to Sonoma County tribes such as our own, who have an extensively documented presence here,” Lytton Rancheria Chairwoman Margie Mejia wrote to the supervisors on behalf of the tribe. “Unlike the Koi Nation, my tribe has distinct names and village sites within the County, our stories and traditions are tied to this cultural landscape, and our ancestors are buried here.”

Letters from the Graton Rancheria, owners of the Graton Resort and Casino near Rohnert Park; the Dry Creek Rancheria, which owns the River Rock Casino near Geyserville; and the Cloverdale Rancheria all use the same language and are all dated Feb. 18. Each came to county staff in a FedEx envelope on Feb. 22, according to documents obtained by The Press Democrat through a public records request. It is unclear who originally wrote the letter.

The Kashia Band submitted a similarly worded resolution, dated Feb. 12, to the county.

Koi tribal Vice Chairman Dino Beltran indicated the tribe was blindsided by the resolution.

“Since our fee to trust application was filed on Sept. 15, 2021, the Koi Nation has actively reached out to local elected and community leaders to have an open discussion and inform them of our resort and casino plans,” he wrote in an email to The Press Democrat. “We are surprised and troubled that this resolution was placed by Sup. Gore on the Board’s agenda without any notice to us.”

Supervisor James Gore, chair of the board of supervisors, represents much of northern Sonoma County, including the land off Shiloh Road, where the Koi Nation plans to build.

Gore said he met with Sonoma County’s five tribal chairs individually after the Koi Nation first announced its plans for the casino in September. During those conversations all five tribal leaders said they opposed the project, Gore said.

“In essence, the reason that this resolution is before us in response to those letters, because we’re taking the lead from those other tribes,” Gore said.

Gore said he has not spoken with anyone from the Koi Nation about the resolution.

The item coming before the board echoes the opposing tribes’ letters, referring to the Koi Nation as a “Non-Sonoma County Tribe” in the resolution’s title.

Before drafting the resolution, the county did not extensively study the Koi Nation’s history but reviewed its own records to determine whether there was any prior relationship between the county and the Koi, Gore said.

“There’s no record of any connection or communication between the county and the Koi Nation before this [September] announcement,” said Gore.

The county is also waiting for the U.S. Department of the Interior to determine whether the Koi have any ancestral rights to the land. That process could take years.

A federal ruling on the Koi Nation’s Sonoma County connections would supersede any county finding. But Gore stood by the county’s description of the Koi Nation as a non-Sonoma County tribe.

“I think this is a very fair assessment for a tribe that used to be called the Lower Lake Rancheria,” Gore said.

The Koi Nation is one of 109 federally recognized Indigenous tribes in California and is part of the Southeastern Pomo people. Most of its 90 members live in Sonoma County.

Koi tribal officials have said their ancestors were forced from their land by a pattern of genocide, enslavement and diseases that devastated the Pomo people and other tribes. Two federal treaties struck by the tribe were not honored and the tribe’s former rancheria in Lake County was uninhabitable, according to Beltran.

The Koi Nation’s history of pursuing casinos elsewhere is another sticking point for those challenging the project.

The Koi previously attempted to acquire reservation land to build a casino near Oakland International Airport in the 2000s, and made another try on Mare Island, across the strait from Vallejo, in 2014, according to the opposing tribes.

Last September, just days after the Koi announced their land purchase, Graton Rancheria said it would make contributions of up to $3 million each to Cloverdale Rancheria and Kashia. The payments are part of a 2012 revenue-sharing agreement with Sonoma County connected to the tribe’s Rohnert Park-area gaming resort.

Representatives of Graton and Lytton Rancheria declined to comment. Calls to the other three opposing tribes went unanswered.

While a resolution by the Board of Supervisors would be the strongest piece of opposition voiced by local government thus far, it would by no means doom the Koi casino project.

It is ultimately up to the Department of the Interior to approve the tribe’s land-to-trust application and confirm that the development meets the requirements of the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act. The department does consider community input, said Judith Shapiro, a Washington, D.C.-based attorney who has spent 35 years practicing tribal gaming law, primarily on behalf of tribes. But it would take more than public opinion to convince the Interior Department to deny the Koi’s application.

“Just because the locals don’t want it doesn’t mean it will be turned away,” Shapiro said. “A lot of people saying ‘not in our backyard’ is not a good reason, because historically speaking, they’re camping in other people’s backyard. But there is public notice, and administrative things associated with environmental review or historic ties that could affect the process.”

The tribe’s proposed Shiloh Resort & Casino would be built on 68 acres off Shiloh Road, southeast of Windsor.

Plans include 2,500 slot and other gaming machines, a 200-room hotel, six restaurant and food service areas, a meeting center and a spa. The Koi Nation has partnered with the Chickasaw Nation, a much larger tribe that owns 23 casinos in Oklahoma.

If built as designed, the project would rival the 320,000-square-foot casino owned by the Federated Indians of Graton Rancheria. Opened in 2013 on Rohnert Park’s western edge, the gaming resort is the largest in the Bay Area.

Tuesday’s resolution is set to appear as part of supervisors’ consent agenda in the morning. The consent agenda is typically used for items the board does not expect to discuss before voting, however supervisors can request an item be set aside for discussion or comment before voting.

Gore said he expects to make a few comments, ahead of any vote.

Should the federal government approve the Koi’s application, Gore said the board could change the resolution to oppose the project on other grounds like its impact to the surrounding neighborhood.

“It might be based on other things,” Gore said.

Reach Staff Writer Emma Murphy at 707-521-5228 or emma.murphy@pressdemocrat.com. Reach Staff Writer Phil Barber at 707-521-5263 or phil.barber@pressdemocrat.com.]

EDITOR’S NOTE: This story has been revised to note that the Koi Nation is part of the Southeastern Pomo people. An earlier version contained inaccurate geographical reference.