Putting slot machines in America
Some readers may have heard I’m planning to put slot machines in One Niagara. Actually, a little explanation is in order.
I do indeed plan to put in slots. However, unlike Seneca, which gives 25 percent of its profits to Albany, I plan to give 100 percent to the city of Niagara Falls.
My plan is not to profit but, rather, to challenge the unpatriotic idea that the Seneca Nation of Indians are permitted to have slot machines while Americans may not.

It was outrageously stupid to create a foreign-owned casino and a tax-free nation amidst a declining community. Fortunately we can remedy this at One Niagara.

As opposed to the sovereign Seneca taking over the town, will the fabulous One Niagara, with its breathtaking views of the Falls,
be our new American-owned casino?

Happily, the city can make a lot of money from my plan. Consider: A recent, surreptitious examination of the annual tape on a slot machine in the Seneca casino revealed that it took in more than $5 million during a 12-month period and paid out slightly more than $3 million (60 percent payout). A single slot machine made $2 million for Seneca, while the city for its entire share of the Seneca compact got only $18 million.

Now, admittedly, this particular machine is popular among gaming fools — who collectively lost $2 million in it in 12 months. But, do the math: I plan to, initially, put in 24 slots. At $1 million per machine, I will, with a mere two dozen, be able to gift to the city what the entire 50-acre tax-free nation gives to Niagara Falls. My slots however will not take up even one-tenth of an acre.
A little math says a lot
However, even if I cannot, through American entrepreneurialism, earn a million per year per slot, I can always add more. Seneca has 2,200 slot machines.

This raises an interesting point: Niagara Falls gets 6.25 percent of slot revenues from Seneca: 25 percent of Albany’s 25 percent share. Mathematically, the profit from 138 average-performing slots at Seneca is Niagara Falls’ total share. This shows how innately stupid we are: We created a tax-free nation to compete against us — in exchange for the profit from 138 slot machines.
While people foolishly talk about a billion dollar casino — the entire city’s share is equivalent to 138 slots — which would cost as little as $500,000 to buy and install. In Las Vegas, 138 slot machines are found in some supermarkets and gas stations!
Is Seneca better than Americans?
Some people are blithely unaware that Seneca has superior legal rights: For these, please note: Based on ethnicity alone, a Seneca can open a casino; an American may not. They can open a business tax-free. We may not. They can build without complying with building codes; we may not. They can seize land and take it out of America and make it part of Seneca for more tax-free businesses. They can secede from the Union — piecemeal. We may not, of course. These things give Seneca a pretty big advantage.
And this they exercise, not on historic reservation land, but in downtown Niagara Falls, historically part of the USA.
The harm Seneca has done
Of course, there are those who wish to preserve Seneca superiority by arguing its profitability. Generally they neglect to mention that land ceded to the Seneca nation is forever property tax-free. Items that used to generate sales tax are purchased sales tax-free in Seneca stores. Ye t Americans pay for roads, sewers and water that lead to Seneca; and increased criminal justice and social welfare costs associated with casino-fueled gambling addiction.
Nor do those who wish to keep Seneca above us like to mention that Seneca businesses compete tax-free against tax-paying businesses in one of the highest-taxed places in the USA. While Seneca is gleaming, the area adjacent to Seneca is desolate. Lost in Seneca’s wake, as iconic of Seneca’s community destroying impact, was the ice skating rink and the convention center; closed to date: 11 restaurants, 26 taverns, 14 retail stores and four hotels.

Positive spin-off? The tax-free Seneca having an impact on neighboring properties in Niagara Falls.

Meanwhile Seneca has opened restaurants, taverns, retail stores and a giant hotel — all tax-free.
Even a dunce can understand there is an incredibly unlevel playing field.
Still, advocates for Seneca superiority point to $72 million Seneca paid in payroll. Yet the average American’s job at Seneca pays $17,000; like MacDonald’s and Convenience stores. Meanwhile, studies suggest that for every job created by a casino, at least one regional (better paying) job is lost. There aren’t more jobs, just more Americans working under Seneca.
And kindly remember, Seneca has an employment policy that states a Seneca has the right to take an American’s job any time. Some countries take care of their own. If you add hundreds of millions in sales tax lost;
property tax lost on (former U.S.) now Seneca land; lost convention business; businesses failures because of unfair Seneca advantages; the substitution of local entertainment money into gambling; and the cost of gambling addiction — regional losses add up to billions. But that’s not all: The Seneca/Albany compact provides for Seneca acquiring additional, adjacent land — to remove from the USA — for more tax-free businesses to compete against us. Consider the deterrent effect: What new business would, in a highly taxed, over-regulated and declining city, want to invest and compete against a tax-free nation next to it?
Do we have a moral obligation to surrender to Seneca?
In light of this, I have publicly said, “I do not think we should allow foreigners to have more rights than our own children.”
“Foreigners?” my critics chastise. “They are more American than you!”
But Seneca, by their own acclamation, is a sovereign nation. You can’t have it both ways: American when it suits you, a foreign nation when it helps you.
“Still,” referring to people such as Columbus or Custer, my critics hotly rebut, “ ‘We’ savaged the Indians!”
But their argument that I, you or “we” should have lesser legal rights, based on deeds done by others, prior to our birth, just because they had the same skin color, I tell them, “is blatantly racist. Demanding equality, however, is not racist."
That usually gives them their quietus.
However, some maudlin lambs still feel they owe the debts of their ancestors who they erroneously think “stole” Niagara Falls from the poor (now rich) Seneca. Actually, the “Neutrals,” occupied Niagara Falls until the mid-18th century, when Seneca “stole” Niagara Falls and exterminated the Neutrals. Seneca squatted here only 50 years before the Europeans threw them off and made Niagara Falls, ultimately, part of America. T o assuage the guilt of the feeble hearted, however, kindly remember the warlike Seneca would have conquered your ancestors, if they had the strength. The difference is, had Seneca won, it’s unlikely their descendants would feel guilty. Ask a Seneca if they think they should share their gaming profits with the descendants of the Neutrals.
A secret revealed
With all this militating against Seneca preferences, why do many local officials want it continued?
Those who know politics know that elected officials have “discretionary” money (also called “pork”). This money can go almost anywhere — to politically-favored charities or politically-motivated events or certain local businesses or engineers or contractors for certain projects. Politicians use pork to repay campaign contributions and get people to vote for them.
The Seneca compact is, like it or not, the mother of all pork — since the money local officials get to distribute is in the millions.
Hence, while the Seneca/Albany compact is not good for our city, it is good for certain elected officials. They can use Seneca pork to make themselves look awfully good. Don’t expect them to demand equality with Seneca.
They never had so much pork in their lives.
• • •
And finally, hopefully, for your complete delectation, I do hope to see you soon at our new, patriotic, American-owned slot machines
at One Niagara in Niagara Falls, N.Y.

Frank Parlato Jr. can be reached at frank@frankreport.com.