Sean C. Morgan
Of The New Era
The Sweet Home City Council has agreed to consider allowing poker tournaments at local businesses.
Chewy’s Tavern owner James Ashcraft approached councilors at their regular meeting on Feb. 13 with a request to reconsider their previous opposition to the idea. The council had considered a similar request by Frank Chau, then owner of T&M Pizza in 2005. The council also heard a request last fall from another Sweet Home man who was running tournaments in Springfield.
The difference with the second request, which is still under consideration by the council, is that the tournament operator does not own the hosting business.
Ashcraft called Police Chief Bob Burford to inquire about progress on that request, Burford told the council. He explained that the Public Safety Committee has been assigned to look into it; and since then the committee has researched Springfield’s ordinance and talked to the police chief there.
“The chief from Springfield told me that parts of the ordinance have been changed,” Burford said. A portion of the ordinance conflicted with an opinion by the state attorney general, namely because the tournament operator received an entry fee from each player in addition to the buy-in cost.
When a city allows it, under state law, a business, such as a bar, offering a tournament cannot collect an entry fee, Burford said. Rather, they only make money through the sale of drinks and food, items unrelated to the gambling. The same apparently applies to independent tournament operators.
Ashcraft said he has personal experience as a tournament player himself.
“I have the equipment to do it right now, in my establishment right now. I’m just here to try to get it going.
“I’ve never seen any problems with it in any establishment I’ve been in.”
Ashcraft argued that the tournaments are simply competitions and people are just trying to get to the end of it. He has been running a tournament at his home, which is legal for two years, and has had no problems related to it.
Mayor Craig Fentiman said the council has been opposed in the past to social gambling because it does not want to allow activities that place any further burden on the Police Department, which was dealing with an increased call volume the last time the council considered the issue.
“I’d like to look at it again,” Councilor Eric Markell said, agreeing with Ashcraft’s contention that people participating “are interested in winning the money, not drinking. I think we can take a look at different options.”
Those options could even include allowing no alcohol consumption until after the event, said Markell, who is a policeman in Coburg.
Fentiman indicated he was open to the idea.
“I think we can make it work, set up some kind of rules so that if they want to they can have some sort of poker tournaments in the city of Sweet Home,” he said. “The first time, we had our reasons, good reasons, whether people agreed or not.”
Council member Rich Rowley said he’s opposed to allowing gambling.
“I personally am not in favor of having this type of activity in this town,” he said, and he did not want to bring it back up for discussion.
Councilor Scott McKee Jr. agreed with Markell, saying, “I’m totally open to continuing with this.”
Voting to revisit social gambling were Fentiman, Markell, McKee and Jim Bean.
Jim Gourley and Rowley voted against revisiting the issue.