Bill Hocker | Mar 20, 2015 on: Open Comments

NVR: Possible Indian casino plan alarms vintners, county
NVR: Local groups meet to analyze casino threat (Including Vision 2050 quote!)
NVR: Judge rules against Wappo tribal recognition lawsuit

Read the comments to the articles: a lot of satire surrounding the idea that the vintners have ruined the valley already with their lust for the tourist dollar, so who are they to protest one more tourist attraction. Whether the potshots are sincere or warranted or not, the idea is out there that the valley is becoming something that none of us, residents, growers or vintners, want to see and the wine industry shares most of the blame for not controlling tourism growth when it was powerful enough to do so.

Now, as the development and tourist industries have begun to dominate the future economics of the county, with interests that align naturally with the money, jobs and development that might accompany a casino, the wine industry is beginning to get nervous. How fortuitous that a NIMBY army has already become mobilized in its pushback against the wine industry, a force that can now be enlisted by the vintners and the county against the casinos.