SACRAMENTO -- Contestants in the electoral battle over Proposition Five Monday sparred over whether to hold a series of three debates about the Indian gambling initiative.
The Coalition Against Unregulated Gambling, the group leading opposition to the initiative, proposed the debates in a letter to Daniel Tucker, chair of Californians for Indian Self-Reliance.
Tucker responded that his group would be willing to participate in debates between "direct representatives of the major funders" in the contest, which he identified as California Indian tribes and Nevada casinos.
"Public debates are useful in holding people accountable for the conduct of their campaigns and the Nevada casinos have a lot to defend in their sponsorship of the worst anti-Indian scare campaign in recent history," Tucker said in a prepared statement.
Gina Stossi, a spokeswoman for opponents, said she hadn't seen Tucker's statement and couldn't respond directly to it.
"We have a very broad-based coalition," she said, referring to business, labor, religious, local government and other opponents. "I don't know who our spokespeople might be."
Neither she nor a spokesman for the initiative could recall formal debates in the past between two sides in an initiative campaign.
California gambling tribes contributed $24.6 million toward passing Proposition Five in the first half of this year, and businesses with interest in Nevada casinos donated $900,000 of the $930,000 raised by opponents, according to reports filed with the secretary of state.
Proposition Five would allow current gambling tribes to continue offering their existing electronic video and other games. The proposition includes an agreement between tribes interested in operating casinos and the state. Such agreements, known as compacts, are required by federal law.
The governor has negotiated different compact with 11 tribes in the state, but so far hasn't been able to get any of them approved by the Legislature, as required by a state court decision.
The Assembly Governmental Organization Committee in June killed a bill intended to ratify a compact between the state negotiated by the governor and the Pala Band of Mission Indians of San Diego.
On Monday, Senate leader John Burton, D-San Francisco, revived the effort to get legislative approval of the governor's compact with Pala and other tribes.
Burton amended Assembly Bill 1442 to include expanded provisions that would approve all 11 compacts.
Most advocates of the initiative oppose the governor's proposed compact as an overly broad restriction on their sovereignty . Tribes that have signed it, defend the compact as a proper exercise of their sovereignty.