SNOHOMISH — What Coby Dilling had in mind was a few card tables.
He and his wife, both teachers, thought they might open an old-time saloon in downtown Snohomish: a place to eat, drink, dance and play a hand of poker.
An off-hand mention of his plan to a city employee set off a chain of events that could ban public card rooms in Snohomish, something that’s been legal in town for years.
“I’m still trying to figure out what happened,” said Dilling, who lives just outside the city limits.
The issue showed up on the City Council agenda this week. After a contentious 20-minute discussion, the council voted 4-3 to move forward with repealing the card room ordinance, even though there are no public card rooms licensed in the city now.
A half-dozen groups, including the Snohomish Senior Center, do have licensed social card games, but these nonprofits would not be affected by a ban.
A formal vote is tentatively scheduled for June.
“I didn’t realize we had an ordinance that allowed card rooms,” City Councilwoman Melody Clemans said at the meeting. “These are economic times that are difficult, and it is the wrong time to bring (this type of) night life to stimulate our economy.”
Dilling said he opened a can of worms by letting City Hall officials know what his idea was for renovating an old vacant downtown building. Then he discovered the card room ordinance was on a council agenda.
“I understand the fears about casinos but there wasn’t even an opportunity to explore this concept farther,” he said.
But a few poker tables could bring some more variety to the downtown nightlife.
“I didn’t want to destroy the character of Snohomish. That’s why I moved here in the first place. I don’t think one poker table is a detriment to the community,” he said.
Public card rooms, sometimes called mini-casinos, are for-profit businesses where blackjack and poker are played. In some cases, the house has a stake; in others, players pay a fee to play against each other.
The Washington State Gambling Commission already tightly regulates card rooms.
They can’t have more than 15 tables, for instance. The state issues licenses only after conducting criminal background checks and vetting where the business gets its money, said Susan Arland, a commission spokeswoman.
Cities can decide whether they want to allow card rooms. If they do, the city can’t limit how many come into town. State law trumps many local rules the city might want to put into place to regulate card rooms, such as business hours, security and lighting.
“We interpret the law as all or nothing,” Arland said.
Cities can impose up to a 20 percent gross tax on revenues, and Snohomish levies the maximum amount in its current ordinance. The average tax collected statewide on card rooms is 10 percent to 12 percent, Arland said. By state law, those taxes are supposed to go mainly toward local law enforcement.
When would-be business owner Dilling saw the card room on the City Council agenda, he figured the city might discuss lowering the tax. It’s not feasible to make money off a card game with taxes that high, he said.
Instead, several council members argued Tuesday night that card rooms could change the community for the worse, and contribute to crime and gambling addictions. A Snohomish high school marketing teacher testified that allowing mini-casinos would exacerbate a growing teen gambling problem.
“This is my home, and no card room should show up in our town,” Mayor Randy Hamlin said at the meeting. “You either stand for something or nothing at all, and I stand for it not in the city. I’m inclined to remove it from the books — period.”
It would be tempting in tough economic times to squeeze every dollar of revenue, Hamlin said Friday, but the cost to the city would be too great. He’s concerned about mini-casinos moving into Snohomish and changing the fabric of the historic downtown.
Four members — the mayor, Lynn Schilaty, Clemans and Dean Randall — pressed to go forward with repealing the ordinance. Karen Guzak, R.C. “Swede” Johnson and Doug Thorndike were in favor of leaving the ordinance alone.
Johnson later called what happened at the meeting a “slap in the face” to business people.
“We need any and all kinds of business in the city of Snohomish,” Johnson said. “It’s up to the entrepreneur to go into business. If I were a prospective business person, I might scratch my head and say maybe there’s some place else to go.”
Thorndike expressed puzzlement over why the City Council was discussing an ordinance already on the books. The council’s decision struck him as unfair.
“It’s like the pool hall in River City in the ‘Music Man,’” he said. “It just floored me. Afterward, I was so sorry for the poor man.”
City manager Larry Bauman put the issue on the agenda because he didn’t think all the council members knew that social card games were allowed.
Another form of gambling in the city, pull tabs, won’t be affected by any changes to the ordinances. The city expects about $40,000 in pull tab tax revenue this year and has received $22,000 so far.
Judy Vigoren of Snohomish played Texas Hold’em regularly at a downtown bar until last year. Now, she sometimes plays at a licensed game at the Buzz Inn on land across the Snohomish River.
“I hate it,” she said. “I don’t like government control anyway but there’s nothing wrong with playing card games.”
Even if the ordinance is repealed, the game at the Buzz Inn will still go on. It’s outside city limits.
Debra Smith: 425-339-3197, dsmith@heraldnet.com.
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