Santa Barbara County will drop its protest of an expanded alcohol license that allows the Chumash Casino to serve customers at a cafe and hotel in addition to its fine dining restaurant, despite efforts Tuesday by county supervisors Doreen Farr and Janet Wolf to keep it in place.

Farr, whose 3rd District includes the casino in the Santa Ynez Valley, questioned Sheriff Bill Brown to establish that both state and county economic factors are cutting into the money available to pay for patrols in the area.
As a result, she said, the balance between community safety and business growth is out of whack.

“We want to assist the business community to expand, grow and increase profits,” Farr said. “On the other hand, there’s the overwhelming guiding principle of land use, and the finding of whether something is in the best interest of the community. I think that we’ve lost this balance.”

Brown told the board that over the last two years, the state has been slow to reimburse the county for the $675,000 it uses to pay for five additional deputies and other law enforcement personnel who respond to casino incidents.
The money is contributed to a state fund by the Santa Ynez Band of Chumash Indians to offset law-enforcement costs related to the casino operations.
“We are no longer in a position in the Sheriff’s Department to gamble and hope we get paid for these positions,” Brown said.

The approval followed a motion by Farr, which was seconded by 2nd District Supervisor Wolf, to continue the protest. It failed on a 3-2 vote.
Fifth District Supervisor Steve Lavagnino then moved to approve a county staff recommendation to withdraw the protest as long as 18 conditions are met — including those in a July 8, 2010, letter by Brown: restriction of bottle sales throughout the facility; assurance that children under the age of 18 are not allowed on the gaming floor or showroom; and that alcohol may only be sold in specific locations.

That motion passed 3-2, with Farr and Wolf voting no.
Frances Snyder, the tribal spokeswoman, said last week that the tribe has signed off on the conditions requested by the county.

The supervisors said they’d received hundreds of letters and emails about the controversial issue, but turnout at the meeting was unexpectedly sparse. The board had set aside an hour for the discussion but heard testimony from only a handful of speakers before making a decision in about 20 minutes.

Government watchdog Andy Caldwell, representing the Coalition of Labor, Agriculture and Business, noted that the fact that few people showed up to speak on the issue indicated that the community at large doesn’t “think it’s controversial for an establishment to want to serve alcohol with a meal.”
And Caldwell used the 1,400 arrest reports linked to incidents at the casino that are being touted by the nonprofit group Preservation of Los Olivos (P.O.L.O.) as evidence of a problem, as an indication that the tribe is committed to public safety.

The casino has “one of the most assertive arrest policies of any hotel or event center on the Central Coast,” Caldwell told the board.
Several others, however, said the arrest reports, which include driving under the influence and drug-related arrests, illustrate the kind of activities that are associated with the casino.

“There is no other business in this state that could have a liquor license with this kind of activity,” said Santa Ynez Valley resident Doug Herthel. “It’s beyond us why our public safety officials aren’t protecting us.”

Santa Ynez resident Bob Field said the reason few showed up at the hearing is that the public believes the license is a “done deal” rather than a discussion, and that there’s an intimidation factor in standing up to the tribe. He urged the board to take a tip from Nancy Reagan and “Just say no.”

When the casino and hotel were built, the Chumash received a “type 47” general restaurant license that restricted the serving of alcohol to The Willows, the fine-dining restaurant at the casino.

In May 2010, the tribe applied to the ABC for a “premises to premises transfer” to expand the license to include the adjacent Creekside Buffet and the hotel next door.

That June, the supervisors voted 3-2 to protest the application — noting the casino’s half-mile distance from three elementary schools, a high school and a YMCA; a concentration of liquor licenses in the area; and potential creation of a law enforcement problem and other police issues.

The ABC granted the tribe an interim license in September 2010.
Farr said that the county’s initial concerns are not addressed by the 18 conditions included in the staff recommendation approved Tuesday, and that now they’re compounded by the lack of funding for public safety personnel.
“I can’t underscore enough what a huge impact this will be to the valley if we can’t find funding to pay for existing law enforcement much less find funding to address any increased impact from this license,” Farr said.

“If we can’t find funding for that, and I don’t know where it’s going to come from right now, there won’t be a status quo for safety in the valley, it’ll be going in the opposite direction.”