In California, the Federated Indians Of Graton Rancheria has announced that the $175 million expansion of its Graton Resort And Casino near San Francisco is on track to open on November 15 offering 200 additional hotel rooms and suites alongside a fitness center and spa.

According to a report from The Press Democrat newspaper, the federally-recognized tribe opened the $800 million Sonoma County casino operated by Las Vegas-based Station Casinos in November of 2013 before breaking ground on the six-story hotel expansion a full year ago.

“This completes, or is the icing on the cake, of what we’ve always wanted to be,” Greg Sarris, Chairman for the Federated Indians Of Graton Rancheria, told the newspaper. “We didn’t want to have just a casino and, of course, the wonderful restaurants, and we love the casino but we wanted a facility here in wine country where Sonoma County and the North Bay could have conventions and much of what is lacking, I think, in the larger community.”

The Press Democrat reported that the expansion project will transform the facility just outside of the city of Rohnert Park along US Route 101 into a “full-fledged Las Vegas-style resort complex” complete with a pool and a 20,000 sq ft multi-purpose meetings space. Hotel rooms and suites in the expansion range from 500 sq ft to 2,600 sq ft in size and feature floor-to-ceiling windows with views of the surrounding countryside and the picturesque Sonoma Mountains.

The newspaper explained that demand for rooms in the new expansion is already so high that the Federated Indians Of Graton Rancheria has already taken bookings into 2018.

“I was actually surprised by that,” Joe Hasson, General Manager and Vice-President for Graton Resort And Casino, told The Press Democrat. “I had to ask a salesperson to double-check the date. It speaks to how this is resonating throughout the lodging community.”

In a press briefing, the Federated Indians Of Graton Rancheria declared that the soon-to-open meetings space at the Graton Resort And Casino will be able to seat up to 800 people for catered occasions and around 1,700 for live entertainment events and the venue can even be separated into seven smaller rooms via the use of special partitions.

“Sonoma County has been unable to facilitate large conventions all in one hotel and now that ballroom allows us to do that,” said Sarris.

Regarding the new pool, the Federated Indians Of Graton Rancheria proclaimed that guests at the new-look Graton Resort And Casino will soon be invited to relax among palm trees in dozens of chaises, beds and loungers or in one of eight private cabanas.

“You don’t see neon and lots of those kinds of lights or bright colors,” Sarris told the newspaper. “You see stonework [and] you see colors that reflect the mountains. In that way, we want to make it warm and make it, as I like to say, Sonoma County-appropriate.”