The casino industry is an extremely lucrative industry if one knows how to run and manage a casino. The Indian tribes in the United States have specialized in building and running casinos on their reservations and have thrived off the revenue generated by these casinos, and tribal members have profited from working at jobs created by these casinos.

So when the Chukchansi tribe in Central California started their multi-million dollar casino resort, tribal members believed that their tribe would prosper and each family would benefit from the revenue generated from the casino. The tribe has a policy of sharing casino revenue with each tribal family so that everyone benefits equally.

However reports emerged that tribal leaders were slowly dismantling the tribe by removing families from the tribe due to a number of reasons. The Chukchansi tribe had over 1800 families in the early 80s but as of today only 900 families are present. Some members of the tribe have accused tribal leaders of cutting down the number of tribal families in order to get a bigger share of revenue as there are now fewer families to split the profits with. Nancy Ayala who is a member of the Chukchansi tribal council has been accused of being the mastermind in kicking out tribal members.

Tensions have escalated within the tribe  and have resulted in violence and as a result the Chukchansi Gold Resort and Casino was shutdown and is no longer in operation. Now there is no revenue for the tribe and everyone has to bear the loss.

Ayala disagrees with her opponents and states that the tribe should officially have only 46 members. She said when the tribe started construction of the Chukchansi Gold Resort and Casino many Indians added themselves to the tribe as  they wanted to take advantage of the revenue being generated. In a statement, Ayala said “It wasn’t even money; it was the idea of money. There weren’t that many Indians up on the hill before then the casino came and people started moving in.”

Unless the tribe manages to solve its internal problems and find a solution to the problem, the Chukchansi Gold Resort and Casino will continue to be closed.