Foundational Stories are short, true accounts of how things got built at Hannahville, and what each one teaches the people who serve on our boards today.

When and where

Summer 1991 into 1992. The tribal casino, just after the move to the highway. I was Vice Chairman of the Casino/Bingo Board.

The problem

The casino was growing fast and running loose. There were no federal compact requirements yet, no written internal controls, and management decisions were made by consensus. Money was leaking, and the leak turned out to be internal theft. The clearest sign was the craps table: for three straight months in 1991, the drop on the dice game was negative.

Willard Stanchina, the controller of tribal finances, put it plainly. A dice game cannot lose money three months in a row. It is statistically impossible. Money was leaving through a door no one had locked.

What we did

Willard came with me every time I visited the casino and walked me through how each process really worked. He built a simple report to track the table games chip inventory, and I delivered it. From then on, a count of the chips went to Willard every day.

That one sheet of paper stopped a routine “cashing in” of high-denomination chips every Saturday afternoon. We brought the chip inventory and the cage under control. Deposits went up quickly.

The pushback came just as fast. The changes exposed problems close to leadership. My own supervisor told me he understood the problem but would not act, and that I would have to do something myself. So I opened the first investigation of its kind at the casino with a senior law enforcement officer. We presented what we found to a quorum of the Gaming Board, and they voted unanimously that a member of casino management had been involved in the loss of control of the craps game and the cage.

“A negative drop for three straight months was not bad luck. It was money leaving through a door no one had locked. Written controls were the lock, and in 1992, we still had not built it.”

What it became

Protecting the drop became the foundation of everything after it. The drop is the cash, tokens, and chips collected from every table and machine. The count, the deposit, the payroll, and the money that reaches tribal members all depend on it. The daily chip report was the first real control, and the deposits it secured are what funded daily tribal operations. The next year I was elected Chairman of the Gaming Board, and when IGRA rules took effect in 1992, written controls became the standard the casino was measured against.

Willard also gave me something that outlasted the report. He reminded me that my duty was to the tribal members who elected me to the board. That is what kept me pushing when it would have been easier to look away.

Lesson for boards today

Ask for the reports. A board that does not see the daily numbers cannot protect the revenue it is responsible for. When the numbers do not make sense, say so out loud, even when the problem sits close to leadership. Your obligation is to the members who elected you, not to the people in the room.

From Chapter 10, “The Dice Game,” in A System Built by Tribal Members. — Leroy Wandahsega II, Founder, Potawatomi Life

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