Each day, more than 2,000 people stream through the doors of Win-River Casino to gamble or attend concerts and special functions.

Established in 1993 and expanded several times since then, the now 87,000-square-foot casino floor features 1,026 slot, video poker and video blackjack machines, 12 Vegas-style table games, an eight-table poker room for high stakes card matches as well as live and high stakes Bingo, according to a fact sheet available from casino authorities.

Despite the potentially explosive mix of people, alcohol and gambling - a recipe that Shasta County Sheriff Tom Bosenko describes as "ideal for disaster" - the casino remains a haven for its clients and employees alike, contends Maria Orozco, public relations director for Redding Rancheria.

"This is the safest place to work or play in town," said Orozco during a recent tour of the facility's safety, security and surveillance systems.

Indeed, a casual visitor easily notices some of the more than 400 high-definition pan-and-tilt or fish-eye Pelco surveillance cameras while walking from the surrounding parking lots into the casino itself.

"We don't hide our cameras," explained Gerald Miller, surveillance director and the person responsible for the most recent $1 million-plus upgrade to the casino's system. "We want people to know we are watching them."

Tucked away behind a nondescript, unmarked doorway accessible only with a pass code, two or three surveillance workers and a shift supervisor sit for hours in a darkened room to more easily scan an array of 32 flat-screen monitors, some capable of as many as 16 simultaneous camera views apiece.

Linking the camera lenses and banks of flat-screen monitors are two rooms crammed with eight-foot tall stacks of networked digital video recorders, analog to digital encoders and an equal number of 5-terabyte hard disk drives. A terabyte is equivalent to 1,000 gigabytes of data.

The entire system will nearly triple in size as Redding Rancheria constructs a four-story hotel with 121 rooms as well as a seven-level, 930-space parking garage, Miller said.

Each surveillance worker is skilled in detecting professional card counters and cheats, having completed four to six months of training at an actual gaming table located in the surveillance control room.

Down on the casino floor, a uniformed guard faces the front door to greet each visitor entering the facility.

"We don't allow people who are obviously drunk to come in here," said Indrick Wilson, security manager for the casino.

The guards routinely review photographs and descriptions of known narcotics users, beligerent patrons and those who have previously been excluded from the casino, Wilson explained.

For those who do consume alcohol on the premises, the casino offers a designated driver program with special arm bands and free gaming tokens, he said.

Throughout the casino, uniformed and plain-clothed officers randomly patrol each of the casino floor's four sections.

"As they walk around, their eyes are constantly looking for any unusual activity," noted Wilson, a retired police officer who spent 10 years working undercover narcotics and serving on drug enforcement task forces in southern California prior to joining the casino in 2006.

"The crimes that typically happen here are usually crimes of opportunity," Wilson said.

The most common incident involves a slot machine that was seeing some play but is temporarily unattended, usually due to a patron leaving the area to get seek refreshment, use the restroom or meet a friend or family member.

In fact, as he watched the surveillance monitors upstairs, someone on the floor reached over and cashed out a slot machine that had recently been vacated by another patron.

The captured and digitally-stored video images were played and replayed as floor security was alerted. Confronted with the video evidence, the patron readily showed a security officer the tell-tale cash-out receipt. A stern warning was issued on the spot by the security officer.

The woman's face, name and ID card number were also noted and stored for future reference.

"We try to educate people on the safeest way to enjoy their stay with us," Wilson said. "The most important lesson we teach is never leave your purse unattended. Keep it on top of your lap."

When someone does get hurt, either due to a slip or a physical altercation, many of the security guards are also trained and certified as emergency medical technicians and first responders, said Michael Anstead, who was named Monday, April 27, as the casino's first Safety Officer.

For the past five years, Anstead has regularly offered instruction and refresher courses in First Aid, cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) and automated external defibrillation (AED) to the casino's 30 security guards, six security supervisors, four dispatchers and one security manager.

"I just graduated 11 security guards from a 44-hour course for First Responder certification though NorCal EMS. That will bring us up to a total of 16 first responders on staff," said Anstead

"With the diversity of our clientele and their range of ages, we are able to take care of anything that a local community would deal with, everything from minor paper cuts to heart attacks and broken bones," Anstead said.

The three-pronged approach to detecting trouble at the door, defusing incidents before they become dangerous and protecting guests and the casino from harm appears to be working, notes Gary Hayward, general manager of Win-River Casino.

"The safety and security of our members, patrons and staff is very important for us at Win-River Casino. We provide the premier gaming experience in Northern California. In order to do so, we need to provide the ultimate gaming experience with safety and security first," Hayward said.

"Win-River Casino is very proud of the internal relationships with security and surveillance and our external relationships with our local law enforcement," Hayward said.

Total calls for service in and around the casino have dropped dramatically between 2007 and 2008 (see table at left) during the same period when an economic downturn has fueled rising crime rates elsewhere in the county and surrounding cities, according to Crime Analyst Becky Hayslett of the Shasta County Sheriff's Office.

Redding Rancheria operates the casino on nearly 31 acres off Highway 273 south of Redding.