The Four Winds Casino in South Bend features 1,800 slot machine-style bingo games. They soon will be replaced with traditional slot machines, along with table games and sports wagering, once the tribal gaming compact agreed to Jan. 21 by the state of Indiana and the Pokagon Band of Potawatomi is finalized.
The Indiana Senate voted 36-11 Tuesday to approve a Tribal-State Gaming Compact that paves the way for table games, sports wagering and other non-bingo gaming at the Four Winds Casino in South Bend.
Senate Bill 356 codifies the agreement reached Jan. 21 by Indiana Gov. Eric Holcomb and Matthew Wesaw, chairman of the Pokagon Band of Potawatomi.
Under the compact, Four Winds can offer any gambling game permitted at state-regulated casinos. Though mobile sports wagering, and any other electronic gaming eventually permitted in Indiana, are limited to the 166 acres of tribal property in South Bend.
The tribe agreed in the compact to pay 8% of its slot machine win to Indiana in exchange for an exclusivity agreement that, in essence, freezes state gaming law within 50 miles of the Four Winds Casino, including in Lake, Porter and LaPorte counties.
As a result, the Majestic Star move to the Hard Rock Casino in Gary can be completed. But no other Region casinos would be allowed to leave their dockside footprint and no casinos elsewhere could relocate to northern Indiana.
The compact must next be approved by the Indiana House, as well as the U.S. Secretary of the Interior, to take effect.
