Sacramento-area card room fined and suspended for COVID violations is reopening

A small Folsom card room, closed for months for violating COVID-19 protocols, is being allowed to reopen under a settlement with state regulators.

Lake Bowl, a six-table card room that’s part of a bowling alley and sports bar complex, must pay a $3,522 fine and serve a 10-day suspension under a settlement announced Thursday by Attorney General Rob Bonta’s office.

The card room has been closed since November after investigators with the attorney general’s Bureau of Gambling Control found numerous pandemic violations at Lake Bowl, including a lack of facemasks on employees and customers and “no protective barriers or dividers between the patrons,” according to an administrative complaint filed against the establishment.

The gambling control bureau said it gave Lake Bowl a chance to correct the violations last October and shut the facility down after the card room’s operators failed to make any changes.

Waldemar Dreher, identified by the state as the card room’s owner, couldn’t be reached for comment.

Lake Bowl is the second Sacramento area card room to tangle with state regulators in the past year. In early 2020, the state shuttered the Magnolia House Casino in Rancho Cordova over violations of cash-management regulations. A few months later, the casino’s owner agreed to sell the operation.