Gambling in Colorado

Imagine you are a resident of a small town in Colorado.
Now imagine that your town is an old mining town and therefore has been subjected to a boom and bust economy, one that is now in full bust mode and has been for a few decades.
Next, imagine that your town is a big Superfund site and therefore it's going to take a lot of money to clean up.
Imagine that your town has a great history and could cash in on that considering Colorado's tourist economy.
Finally, imagine that you are determined to make your town succeed no matter what.

You don't really have to imagine this. Just go to some of the old mining towns in the Colorado mountains that have gone through this very process. Black Hawk and Cripple Creek have dramatically changed their fortunes, image, and look over the past 20 years in order to make themselves economic centers again. Unfortunately, the cost has been very high.

When Colorado passed gambling laws, they made sure that it was low-stakes gambling (mostly slots) and they hoped that the towns would be able to control the gambling. Of course, like many such plans, in Black Hawk the local residents completely lost control of the process. What once was a small mining town is now a series of casino resorts controlled by national gambling and hotel changes, including Las Vegas chains. Gambling was limited to the old town along the creek. How to solve this problem? Shave back the mountain in order to widen the valley and therefore allow a larger casino. In Black Hawk, the economy is now completely controlled by the casinos and local businesses have disappeared, even local gambling outlets. Tour bases race up and down the narrow mountain road, leading to dense traffic in the valley and the need to now widen the highway. Of course, since Black Hawk is within about 45 minutes of downtown Denver, it's very popular with both locals and with people flying in to ski but also want to gamble.

Cripple Creek is something of a different proposition. West of Colorado Springs, it definitely gets its share of gambling tourism. But Cripple Creek is less dominated by national casino chains. The main street of the town still looks like an old mining town, but inside almost every old storefront is a casino. All in all, the physical look of Cripple Creek is less offensive than in Black Hawk. However, Cripple Creek is also home to a significant amount of interesting history that has been completely wiped away by the gambling economy. Home to one of the most violent mining strikes of the early twentieth century, as well as decades of mining surrounding the strikes, this town should have been able to take advantage of a tourist economy without resorting to gambling. Unfortunately, that history is completely wiped away except for a little museum open only part time (it was closed when I was there). Undoubtedly, the vast majority of gamblers at Cripple Creek know nothing about what happened there and know of it only as a place to sit around and play slots and get drunk easily because it's about 9000 feet.

Old mining towns definitely need a shot in the arm and I defend their right to adjust their economies to make the towns viable. But I think Black Hawk and Cripple Creek are examples of how not to do. Black Hawk shows us that gambling is a Pandora's Box. By trying to revitalize their town, they lost control of it altogether. We can look at Cripple Creek with sadness as well, knowing that they could have struck a better balance between gambling and history to create an interesting and economically prospering town.