Under the terms of the agreement between the facilities and the Mohawk Council of Kahnawake, each facility is to contribute $1 million each a year for three years back to the community. Through the course of this pilot project the two facilities are expected to contribute a total of $6 million in royalties back to the community.
The first floor of Playground’s EGD facility opened in mid-December.
Magic Palace, formerly known as Poker Palace, is located on Route 132, held a soft opening last Friday afternoon with 371 EDG and another 66 machines are expected to arrive soon. On opening night a pair of Kahnawa’kehró:non had hit jackpots of $5,000 and $7,000.
“The newly redesigned interior, paired with the first class Mirela’s Restaurant, will provide clients with a unique and pleasant Electronic Gaming Device experience,” Magic Palace said in a statement.
Magic Palace, which started out as Snake’s Poker Club, currently does not offer any poker tables, but said that it is in the process of revamping that and will be offering poker again in the near future.
“It took a lot of work from a lot of people to get us where we are today,” Antuen Mulhallah, Magic Palace General Manager, said.
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Magic Palace Management Consultant Louie John Diabo said that aside from the $1 million a year royalty to the community, Magic Palace is committed to helping contribute to the local economy. Currently, Magic Palace employs 100 people with 20 workers from Kahnawake, Diabo said, with plans of increasing that number.
“We want royalties in the neighbourhood of $1 million going to the community, so that’s direct economic impact going back to the community of Kahnawake,” Diabo said. “Those are the types of things we want to do, along with the employment and just creating a healthy Kahnawake economy.”
Diabo said that, much like Playground, Magic Palace wants to work with Tewatohnhi’saktha on employment training programs to help train Kahnawa’kehró:non to work in the facility.
“Given the situation of the labour market in Kahnawake right now that’s significant because people are going to say ‘hey, I don’t have to cross the bridge, I have the opportunity to work in my own community,’ that’s something the owners are taking pride in,” Diabo said.
Discussions on Electronic Gaming Devices first began in 2017. When Playground’s facility opened in December, Kahnawake Gaming Commission Chairman Mark Jocks explained that the work began in April 2017.
“The KGC was given direction in April of 2017 to start the research and exploratory work to see what would be required to regulate these devices,” Jocks said. “Several drafts were created and modified over the course of 2017 and early 2018 in the event that the MCK approved such an activity.”
With a Mohawk Council Executive Directive on March 27, 2018, the MCK approved EDGs and the following day, the KGC tabled and passed its Regulations Concerning Electronic Gaming Devices.
Responsible for all aspects of dealing various Poker games on a rotational basis, such as, “Texas Hold’Em” and “Omaha” in an accurate manner. Providing friendly, prompt, accurate, and courteous dealing service to players in accordance with standard procedures, maintaining the integrity of the game and explaining aspects of the games. Great Casino, food and Service This is a great little casino for slots and a huge poker area. If you play poker the food is free. They even have chair massages at the table games.
Get your hands on some money magic with the new Electronic Gaming Devices at the cutting-edge game stop – Magic Palace. With the EGD’s bright colours and endearing function, owners are hoping the slot machines will be a hit. (Tehosterihens Deer, The Eastern Door)
Kahnawake Poker Palace Hotel
The day has finally come. Magic Palace is open to the public and is ready to take on the gaming world.
On the cold and intensely windy February 8, Magic Palace (formerly Poker Palace) opened its doors to the public to feast their eyes on their gaming machines.
The house contains 371 Electronic Gaming Devices (EGDs), with 66 arriving soon, according to the owners. Magic Palace used to be Poker Palace, but there is not a poker table on site anymore.
Magic Palace management held a press conference at their grand-opening on the Friday, for the owners and community to see what they have in store.
The conference was introduced by Louie John Diabo and general manager Antoine Mehallah.
“I just began working for them (Magic Palace) last week on giving them advice on a press conference, events, and other activities, that’s why I’m here,” said Diabo, formerly director of finance at the Kahnawake Education Center.
“We’re going to look at possible expansion, and that’s my skill, I build buildings. I’m also the project manager and general business manager for Magic Palace.”
Diabo will also handle financial controls, marketing and policy development.
“We’re competing with big players like Playground and the Montreal Casino, and if they want to raise it a level or two, we’re prepared for that. We have something that they don’t, a fancy and finely-run restaurant – Mirela’s.”
The building is connected to Mirela’s restaurant and offers food to the players of Magic Palace and those looking for a nice dinner. Alcoholic beverages are available to EGD players at no charge.
The building currently has over 20 employees from Kahnawake and they plan on having more in the future. There is the talk of a possible course in French that will help community members get work.
“I was introduced to this project in October, and I take care of getting this place started,” said Mehallah.
“Our goal is to have a possible expansion in the future, and we can’t wait to see more people and have an opportunity to create a wider environment.
“We have the same structure as poker palace, we didn’t have many changes, but safety was a big issue with us. We worked with the Kahnawake Fire Brigade (KFB), with the rules and regulations. It was a long process to get the machines and get to where we are today,” he said.
“It’s been a long time coming, from negotiations that transpired with the MCK, to the regulations, it took time, and at the end of the day we’re happy this arrived now,” said co-owner Barry Alfred.
Poker Palace had its challenges and due to a lack of fluid clientele, closed its doors.
“It was a combination of different things, we re-opened poker, and it didn’t go as well as we anticipated and it was always a vision to combine the two (poker and machines), and because different things transpired, we still plan on putting in the poker tables soon,” he said.
“The vision is always to have a nice facility that’s prosperous and successful. Wverybody wants to be successful; what we were doing with poker became a hard deal, with our huge competitor Playground. We found something that we believe can be profitable to us and the community,” said co-owner Stanley Myiow.
“The successful business will help the community monetarily, and everyone will benefit from it. The goal is to contribute $1 million to the community. The Mohawk Council of Kahnawake will determine where that money will go,” he added.
Myiow further explained that the goal is to give out $3 million at the end of the year back to the community and said more info would come in the future.
“The community or council did not have to donate one dollar, this is from us, and today, money will be going to the community based from the first dollar that goes in a machine,” he said.
Many community members have argued this is nothing but another casino.
“I’m not going to argue with someone who says that, it’s a matter of perspective. I’ll tell you what we don’t have, we don’t have roulette, blackjack or any table games, that real casinos do have,” said Myiow.
“What we have is an electronic gaming facility. Do casinos have these games? Yes they do, but they don’t only have them. There is no real perfect definition for it, but we want to inform the community that this isn’t a casino.”
“The Kahnawake Gaming Commission (KGC) and the MCK have given their blessing with something like this, for me, on management’s opinion, the pure definition of a casino is that there are table games and cash games,” said Diabo.
“Here, the environment we are creating is very controlled. We don’t want local individuals to go and lose their house on a machine; our strategy is that our maximum bet is $10 and the minimum bet is 80¢. There are restrictions on all our machines and ATMs; we have a maximum of $300 for a dispensary.”
Diabo and Mehallah further explained if they noticed someone dropping hundreds of dollars on a machine, when in reality they don’t have that kind of money, they would step in and help or stop them.
The project began in October with the idea of having a majority of EDG over their previous poker house.
“For sure we’d like to see an expansion, we’re tight right now. Playground expanded quite a bit over the years, and we plan to expand as well,” said Alfred. “The idea of a hotel will have to be evaluated with the land bases and the areas.”
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Kahnawake Poker Palace Casino
Kahnawake Poker Palace Entertainment
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