Tribe Paid for Madera Politician’s D.C. Trip–City Council Member Testified for Casino.

By Chris Collins / The Fresno Bee

A Native American tribe that wants to build a casino near Madera paid for a city council member’s trip to Washington, D.C., last year so he could testify in favor of the project, interviews and recently filed court records show.

The council member, Gary Svanda, has been a vocal and longtime supporter of the controversial project. When he testified in front of the U.S. Senate Committee on Indian Affairs in May 2008, he said he was speaking on behalf of the Madera City Council and the Madera County Board of Supervisors, according to a hearing transcript. But neither the city nor the county approved the trip, and some council members said they didn’t find out about it until after he returned. By state law, Svanda was supposed to report the cost of his flight and who paid for it. He never did.

Neither Svanda, the North Fork Rancheria of Mono Indians nor the company that wants to build the casino — Las Vegas-based Station Casinos — would say how much the flight and hotel stay cost, or even which hotel Svanda stayed in.

Government watchdog groups say the trip was a conflict of interest because Svanda was elected to represent Madera residents, not the tribe. Members of the tribe also accompanied Svanda.

“When elected officials need to travel in the service of their community, the public should pick up the tab,” said Douglas Heller, executive director of the nonpartisan Consumer Watchdog group in Santa Monica. “It’s much more expensive in the long run when special interests pay for travel because of the indebtedness politicians inevitably feel.”

In contrast, when Frank Bigelow, a member of the Madera County Board of Supervisors, went on a similar trip in October 2007 to testify before the same committee, the county paid his expenses — a $1,038 flight and a $422 one-night hotel bill, records show.

Bigelow said the county paid for the trip because the Board of Supervisors has voted to support the casino project and he was advocating for the county’s interests.
It’s not clear whose interests Svanda was representing at the hearing. Even though he told the committee the project has “strong local support,” the Madera City Council never has taken a vote to support or oppose the casino project, and council members are divided on it. Cheryl Schmit, founder of the gambling watchdog group Stand Up for California, said Svanda should not have told the committee that he was representing the city. “It’s a criminal offense to lie to Congress,” she said. “That’s a real concern.”

No disclosure made

Svanda says he did nothing wrong. He insists he went only as a private businessman and not as a representative of the city — despite his statements at the hearing.
Svanda said he was only following up on Bigelow’s earlier testimony and that it wasn’t improper for the North Fork tribe to pay for the trip. The tribe bought his air ticket and reimbursed him for his hotel stay, Svanda said.

It’s unclear who asked Svanda to attend the hearing: Svanda said Bigelow asked him to go, but Bigelow said he didn’t. Elaine Bethel-Fink, the tribe’s chairwoman, said questions about who paid for Svanda’s flight and hotel are “petty.”

“My thinking is that anyone on my team should have [their travel costs] paid for to promote our projects,” she said. Bethel-Fink did not elaborate on what she meant by saying Svanda was on her team. Elected officials are required to fill out finance disclosure forms each year that list any gifts worth more than $50. This also includes any payments for travel costs outside of California, though not necessarily hotel costs. Svanda did not disclose either the flight or hotel costs.

The California Fair Political Practices Commission, which enforces the disclosure laws, said such violations could result in a fine of up to $5,000.
If necessary, Svanda said, he will amend his 2008 finance disclosure form to include the cost of the trip. He also said he will abstain from any future votes on the casino “if there is a perceived conflict of interest.”

There wasn’t any indication of who had paid for Svanda’s trip until Station Casinos filed for bankruptcy in late July. Bankruptcy records reviewed by The Bee list hundreds of people, including Svanda, who have received money from Station Casinos over the years. The list does not say how much money they had received or why.

In an initial interview, Svanda said he had no idea why he was on the list and was “not that interested in knowing.” It was not until after he was asked whether it may have been for the Washington, D.C., trip that Svanda acknowledged the tribe had purchased his airline ticket and had reimbursed him for his one-night hotel stay.
It’s unclear why the court records appear to indicate that Station Casinos made the reimbursement when Svanda says the tribe reimbursed him.

Longtime involvement

The North Fork tribe has long sought to build a 55-acre, $350 million casino four miles north of Madera off Highway 99. Station Casinos also owns another 250 acres of adjacent property where the tribe could expand — potentially turning Madera into an entertainment mecca.

Because the property is about 35 miles from the North Fork Rancheria, the tribe must first get approval from the Bureau of Indian Affairs before it can build an off-reservation casino. The bureau has approved only a small number of off-reservation casinos in the past 20 years — and the process is notoriously cumbersome.
In October 2007, the Senate Indian Affairs Committee held a hearing to address complaints from North Fork and other tribes on the slow pace of the process and on several other issues. Bigelow says he doesn’t remember how he first found out about the hearing but asked the committee if he could testify.

At the hearing, Bigelow was joined by Jacquie Davis-Van Huss, then the North Fork tribe’s chairwoman. He asked the committee to encourage federal officials to release a key environmental study on the casino. He also said that both the county and city of Madera “strongly support” the project.

But support is not unanimous — Madera County Supervisor Vern Moss and Madera City Council Member Robert Poythress oppose the project. Madera Mayor Sam Armentrout says he has not taken a stance. A ministerial association in Madera that includes 30 churches and ministries also opposes the casino.

Bigelow said he was invited to testify at the next hearing in May 2008 but couldn’t go because of a previously scheduled conference. He would later describe Svanda in a letter to the Indian Affairs Committee as “one of the initial liaisons from the city to the project’s development team” and as someone who has “been involved since [the casino project's] inception in 2003.”

Svanda, who works as a financial adviser for Edward Jones Investments, was first elected to the City Council in 2000 and served until 2004. After a two-year break, he successfully ran for a second term.

‘False representation’?

During his first term in office, Svanda said, he and a former mayor, Herman Perez, started a business coalition to promote the casino project. The coalition now includes more than a dozen businesspeople and has thrown luncheons and other events to tout the benefits of the casino.
Svanda said the coalition does not receive any money from the tribe or Station Casinos.

At the May 2008 hearing, Svanda was accompanied by the new North Fork tribal chairwoman, Bethel-Fink, and the tribe’s treasurer. He introduced them to the committee as “two important political leaders from my area.” Svanda’s testimony focused mostly on why the casino was a good idea and the need for the Bureau of Indian Affairs to approve the project — noting that it had “very strong local support.”

According to the transcript, Svanda told the committee that he was speaking “on behalf of the City Council of Madera and the Madera County Board of Supervisors.”
In a recent interview, however, Svanda said he was only representing the greater Madera business community and did not represent the city “in any way, shape or form.”

He said he told the committee he was a council member only because its members “wanted to know who I was.” Council Member Poythress said he felt Svanda made a “false representation” by speaking on behalf of the city. “I haven’t been happy with people taking liberties to say the city of Madera supports this project when there has been no official position taken,” he said.