Some longtime locals are becoming downtown Sacramento’s saviors | Opinion
The Shingle Springs Band of Miwok Indians has amassed a degree of wealth largely thanks to the nearby Red Hawk Resort and Casino, which opened in 2008. The Wilton Rancheria is in a similar situation with its Sky River Casino, open for three years.
Both have decided to invest in downtown Sacramento for different reasons, yet the trend is clear. Our region’s tribes are fast emerging as the most important new landowners in the state capital, and their investments are bound to diversify the development footprint of downtown, dominated by government buildings.
It’s hard to imagine landowners with greater roots to this community than this region’s original inhabitants.
The Wilton Rancheria has already shown its proverbial hand. It has become the first North American tribe to be the majority owner of a professional sports team, having purchased the Sacramento Republic FC soccer franchise in November 2024.
The Rancheria initially hoped to build a 12,000-seat stadium in the downtown Railyards district as soon as 2027, but the timing seems unclear. A linchpin to redeveloping the Railyards was the creation of a new improvement district that would capture some of the property tax generated on the land to help build the necessary infrastructure. But a labor union seeking a bargaining agreement at its Elk Grove casino has suddenly gotten interested in the Railyards and affordable housing, and has led a campaign with Railyards residents in hopes of stopping this infrastructure financing agreement.
The city has yet to announce whether, under a new state law, it must wait a year before advancing a different financing plan or whether Railyards residents and landowners will get the chance to approve or deny the plan in a special election. The Rancheria is showing all signs of being a patient landowner and is going nowhere.
Miwok’s two blocks of downtown
The Miwok tribe, on the other hand, has yet to reveal its intentions for two key downtown properties. First, the tribe in 2024 purchased the vacant square block at 301 Capital Mall from the California Public Employees Retirement System for $17 million. And last week, the tribe doubled down by purchasing the adjacent Macy’s building on L Street for $15 million
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Miwok tribe Chairwoman Regina Cuellar told The Bee that it has yet to firm up its redevelopment vision. “We’re open to all of it,” Cuellar said in an interview Thursday. “We’ve talked about housing, retail, a hotel, a museum, family entertainment… We’re open to anything.”
Cuellar said a casino was also a possibility, but there’s a reason the tribal casinos throughout California have largely concentrated in more rural areas and not in downtowns. Only lands held in trust by the tribes in 1988 are automatically eligible for gaming. A downtown casino can only be approved through a complex process involving every level of government imaginable. It’s not impossible, but a downtown casino seems unlikely without the city solidly behind it.
I think casino resorts make way more sense in urban centers as part of a downtown entertainment mix. But the complex state and federal systems that the tribes must navigate are daunting.
Macy’s transformed downtown Sacramento when the department opened in 1963. Something tells me that the Miwok tribe will do something equally transformational on this land and the adjacent block on 301 Capitol Mall. It’s a minor miracle that these key sites didn’t end up in the hands of some heartless firm. They are owned by the stewards who were here first.
This story was originally published July 21, 2025 at 5:00 AM.