Wildhorse Resort & Casino is a

casino A casino is a facility for certain types of gambling. Casinos are often built near or combined with hotels, resorts, restaurants, retail shopping, cruise ships, and other tourist attractions. Some casinos are also known for hosting live entertai ...

owned and operated since 1994 by the

Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation The Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation are the federally recognized confederations of three Sahaptin-speaking Native American tribes who traditionally inhabited the Columbia River Plateau region: the Cayuse, Umatilla, and ...

in the U.S. state of

Oregon Oregon () is a U.S. state, state in the Pacific Northwest region of the Western United States. The Columbia River delineates much of Oregon's northern boundary with Washington (state), Washington, while the Snake River delineates much of it ...

."Wildhorse Resort & Casino."
''500 Nations.'' (retrieved 30 Nov 2009) It is located east of

Pendleton Pendleton may refer to: Places ;United Kingdom *Pendleton, Lancashire, England *Pendleton, Greater Manchester, England ;United States *Pendleton, Indiana * Pendleton, Missouri *Pendleton, New York *Pendleton, Oregon *Pendleton, South Carolina *Pe ...

, on the

Umatilla Indian Reservation The Umatilla Indian Reservation is an Indian reservation in the Pacific Northwest of the United States. It was created by The Treaty of June 9, 1855 between the United States and members of the Walla, Cayuse, and Umatilla tribes. It lies in nort ...

, near Interstate 84.

History

The casino opened in temporary buildings on November 5, 1994, run by Capital Gaming International Inc., with the tribe taking over as managers in 1999. The resort has expanded each year since its beginning, doubling the size of the casino in 2002 and 2003, adding a conference center in 2004, completely renovating its 100-room hotel in 2005 and expanding in 2006-07 to add four food and beverage venues: a buffet

restaurant A restaurant is a business that prepares and serves food and drinks to customers. Meals are generally served and eaten on the premises, but many restaurants also offer take-out and food delivery services. Restaurants vary greatly in appearan ...

, a fine-dining restaurant, a sports bar, a coffee shop and a 24-hour restaurant. After contentious discussion within the tribal community, the previously "dry" (not serving

alcoholic beverage An alcoholic beverage (also called an alcoholic drink, adult beverage, or a drink) is a drink that contains ethanol, a type of alcohol that acts as a drug and is produced by fermentation of grains, fruits, or other sources of sugar. The c ...

s) resort, located on a dry reservation, began serving alcoholic beverages on May 5, 2006. Because of this change, a lounge, Wildhorse Sports Bar, opened in May 2007. Work begin in 2010 to expand the hotel by 202 rooms with a ten-story tower, and add to the casino. The $45 million project was completed in October 2011.

Amenities

Key components of the resort are a casino, five screen cineplex with two 3D screens,

golf course A golf course is the grounds on which the sport of golf is played. It consists of a series of holes, each consisting of a tee box, a fairway, the rough and other hazards, and a green with a cylindrical hole in the ground, known as a "cup". Th ...

hotel A hotel is an establishment that provides paid lodging on a short-term basis. Facilities provided inside a hotel room may range from a modest-quality mattress in a small room to large suites with bigger, higher-quality beds, a dresser, a ref ...

recreational vehicle A recreational vehicle, often abbreviated as RV, is a motor vehicle or trailer that includes living quarters designed for accommodation. Types of RVs include motorhomes, campervans, coaches, caravans (also known as travel trailers and camper ...

park A park is an area of natural, semi-natural or planted space set aside for human enjoyment and recreation or for the protection of wildlife or natural habitats. Urban parks are urban green space, green spaces set aside for recreation inside t ...

, children's entertainment center, teepee camping village, Arrowhead Travel Plaza and the

Tamástslikt Cultural Institute The Tamástslikt Cultural Institute is a museum and research institute located on the Umatilla Indian Reservation near Pendleton in eastern Oregon. It is the only Native American museum along the Oregon Trail. The institute is dedicated to the c ...

tribal museum. The casino offers

poker Poker is a family of comparing card games in which players wager over which hand is best according to that specific game's rules. It is played worldwide, however in some places the rules may vary. While the earliest known form of the game w ...

roulette Roulette is a casino game named after the French word meaning ''little wheel'' which was likely developed from the Italian game Biribi''.'' In the game, a player may choose to place a bet on a single number, various groupings of numbers, the ...

blackjack Blackjack (formerly Black Jack and Vingt-Un) is a casino banking game. The most widely played casino banking game in the world, it uses decks of 52 cards and descends from a global family of casino banking games known as Twenty-One. This fami ...

craps Craps is a dice game in which players bet on the outcomes of the roll of a pair of dice. Players can wager money against each other (playing "street craps") or against a bank ("casino craps"). Because it requires little equipment, "street c ...

, Spanish 21, bingo,

keno Keno is a lottery-like gambling game often played at modern casinos, and also offered as a game in some lotteries. Players wager by choosing numbers ranging from 1 through (usually) 80. After all players make their wagers, 20 numbers (some va ...

and just over 1200 slot machines, 30% of which are in a no-smoking area. The golf course is a championship, 18-hole course designed by John Steidel that opened in 1997, with approximately 30,000 rounds played annually and hosting about 80 tournaments. It includes a driving range, practice greens, rental clubs, a pro shop, and a variety of teaching programs. Seven restaurants are part of the resort and casino: WildRoast Cafe, the Clubhouse Grill, Hot Rock Cafe, Kinship Cafe, Traditions Buffet, The Wildhorse Sports Bar and Plateau Fine Dining. The hotel is connected to the casino while the RV Park is located nearby, between the casino and golf course. The Tamástslikt Cultural Institute, located on the resort grounds, includes permanent and rotating exhibits on the history and culture of the three tribes who make up the

(CTUIR): the

Cayuse Cayuse may refer to: *Cayuse people, a people native to Oregon, United States *Cayuse language, an extinct language of the Cayuse people *Cayuse, Oregon, an unincorporated community in the United States *Cayuse horse, an archaic term for a feral or ...

, Umatilla and

Walla Walla Walla Walla can refer to: * Walla Walla people, a Native American tribe after which the county and city of Walla Walla, Washington, are named * Place of many rocks in the Australian Aboriginal Wiradjuri language, the origin of the name of the tow ...

. The resort has sparked an economic boom for the CTUIR, which has increased the tribal operating budget from less than $10 million in 1992 to approximately $145 million in 2007. That grew to $190 million in 2010 as the casino draws approximately 750,000 people each year. The largest expenditures and the largest single department in the tribal government are devoted to protecting and restoring natural resources on the reservation and throughout the traditional homelands of the three tribes. To this end, the tribes are one of the largest employers of biologists and other environmental scientists in the region.

References

External links

Wildhorse Resort & Casino
official website {{DEFAULTSORT:Wildhorse Resort and Casino Casinos in Oregon Casino hotels Buildings and structures in Umatilla County, Oregon Resorts in Oregon Native American casinos Tourist attractions in Umatilla County, Oregon 1994 establishments in Oregon Native American history of Oregon

History

Amenities

See also

References

External links