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Foxwoods Resort Casino

Foxwoods Resort Casino is a hotel-casino in Ledyard, Connecticut. It was recently the largest casino in the world, however is now second to the Venetian in Macau, China as measured by floor space for gaming, with 340,000 sq ft (31,587 m²)

The entire resort comprises 4,700,000 sq ft (440,000 m²) of space. The casino has over 380 gaming tables including blackjack, craps, roulette, and poker. There are over 7,400 slot machines, as well as a bingo room and keno parlor. There are several restaurants including a Hard Rock Cafe. Foxwoods has 1,416 hotel rooms and a two story arcade for children and teens.

History

Foxwoods was founded in 1986 as a bingo hall. The casino was financed by Lim Goh Tong a Chinese Malaysian who founded the only legal casino in Malaysia and passed away in Oct 2007.

In 1992 the Pequots added table games, followed shortly by slot machines in 1993. G. Michael Brown became the chairman of the casino in 1993. The casino agreed to pay 25% of their slot revenue to the state of Connecticut, a sum that now amounts to almost $200 million per year as of 2007.

Gaming

Blackjack

Blackjack at Foxwoods is played with 6 or 8-deck shoes. All tables are hand-shuffled since the removal of the continuous shuffling machines several years back. The dealer must hit on all totals of 16 or less, and stand on all totals of 17 or more. Foxwoods offers late surrender, double downs on any card and splits up to 4 hands. Specially marked tables offer side bets, including Super Sevens and Match The Dealer. Table minimums start at $10, and on the main gaming areas go up to $25. In the high stakes casino above the Great Cedar Hotel, the tables start at $200 a hand.

Craps

Foxwoods is one of a growing number of casinos offering 3-4-5 times odds. On points of 6 or 8, players are allowed to make an odds bet equal to 5 times their pass/don't pass bet. Points of 5 or 9 allow a 4 times odds bet, and points of 4 or 10 allow a 3 times odds bet. A side effect of this rule is if the player takes the maximum odds the odds payout is always 6 times the pass line bet.

Table minimums are usually $10 but can be as low as $5 during slower hours.

As of early 2008, Foxwoods permits players to bet 5 times odds on all points.

Roulette

Table minimums during the weekend are usually $10 or $25, though you can usually get on a $5 table early on Saturday mornings before 10 am.

Almost all of the wheels are of the American variety (with two green spots, 0 and 00), though there are a few European style wheels with only one zero.

Foxwoods does not allow the "en prison" rule (as played in Europe and Atlantic City, New Jersey), so if you are playing black (or red) and the green zero comes up, your bet is not held or halved, but lost.

Slots & Video Poker

Slot machines at Foxwoods pay out roughly 91% of the money that gamblers bet

In the fiscal year ending June 2003, Foxwoods' slots handled over $9.5 billion. 25% of slot revenue is given to the State of Connecticut. There are over 7,400 machines in five casinos devoted to slots and video poker.

Poker room

Foxwoods spreads several poker games including limit and no-limit Texas hold 'em, Omaha hold 'em (high/low), and seven-card stud. There are also weekly poker tournaments and World Poker Tour events. The poker room underwent an expansion in March 2006, increasing the number of tables it boasts from 76 to 114, making it the largest poker room on the East Coast, and one of the largest in the world.

Bingo Parlor

Foxwoods holds bingo sessions twice daily, and their bingo hall can hold up to 5000 players. The hall features a large stage where the callers sit, smoking and non-smoking sections, video bingo terminals, a pizza vendor, pull tab sales booths, and soda fountains where players may drink as much soda as they wish. Players who win certain games will be allowed to go up on stage and spin a giant wheel with different amounts of money on it, or try to catch as much money as possible in a wind-tunnel-like structure called the "Money Machine".

MGM Grand at Foxwoods

Construction started in November 2005 on a $700 million expansion at Foxwoods. On April 25, 2006, Foxwoods announced that the expansion would hold the MGM Grand brand name, and that the parent company, MGM Mirage would be a partner in the expansion project. The expansion, entitled The MGM Grand at Foxwoods, opened on May 17, 2008. It is a separate building from the main Foxwoods resort, but is connected by a moving walkway. Amenities at the MGM Grand at Foxwoods include: :

2 million square feet (180,000 m²)
53 table games
1,400 slot machines
825 hotel rooms/suites
4,000 seat performing arts theater
Four restaurants and four retail outlets

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Employee Unrest and Drive to Unionization

After announcing in June 2007 that they had started collecting signatures from dealers in support of a union, the United Auto Workers announced in September 2007 that they had collected the requisite number of signatures needed to hold an election to determine whether table games and poker dealers desired union representation. The Tribe challenged the jurisdiction of the National Labor Relations Board over on-reservation Native American enterprises. Following hearings, the National Labor Relations Board ruled in favor of the union and ordered a union election to be conducted. On November 24, 2007, employees voted to unionize with 60 percent in favor and 40 per cent against. The Foxwood dealers cast 1,289 ballots for the union, 852 against representation, and 36 additional ballots were challenged. Approximately 2,700 dealers and dual-rate dealers were eligible to vote in the election.

After the workers won their union, Foxwoods Casino appealed the election results, reasserting its jurisdictional challenge and claiming that the National Labor Relations Board made mistakes in conducting the vote, that the NLRB only printed the ballot in English and only provided notices explaining the election in only one form of the Chinese language, disenfranchised workers, and that interactions by union officials and some voters were unlawful. An NLRB Administrative Law Judge ruled that the union and the board provided ample explanation of the election in a variety of languages. Foxwoods has appealed the decision.

Currently the Foxwoods dealers union has been pushing the state of Connecticut to improve the conditions of their workplace. Workers and union organizers are pushing legislation that would ban smoking on the casino floors of Foxwoods and Mohegan Sun. The sponsor of the casino smoking legislation, state Sen. Mary Ann Handley, D-Manchester, is the co-chairwoman of the legislature’s public health committee. The bill did not pass during the 2008 legislative session.