canada Swan Lake Takes Center Stage

A soon-to-open tribal casino in southern Manitoba will be complemented by destination-friendly attractions, including an 18-hole golf course.

The Spirit Sands Casino, which is jointly owned by the province’s 64 First Nations, is under construction and could open by the end of this year. It’s taking shape on land in Carberry owned by the 1,250-member Swan Lake First Nation.

Gaming has helped to make the Swan Lake tribe more financially secure than other Canadian First Nations, which are often crippled by chronic poverty. On its reservation in Swan Lake, where 725 members live, the tribe has its own gaming center, the proceeds from which have enabled it to build an elementary school and a health-care center. It generates additional income from a pair of smoke shops, some office space, agricultural land that it leases to local farmers, a small gambling center in Headingley, and a buffalo ranch. These days it’s also building a wind farm, set to open next year, to help power the reserve.

But those ventures pale in comparison to what’s planned at Spirit Sands, where the tribe aims to build “luxury cabins,” a 100-room hotel, meeting space, an entertainment venue, an RV park, a recreation center, the golf course, and a “winter resort” for the pleasure of cross-country skiers and snow-mobilers.

The casino in Carberry, one of the gateway towns to Spruce Woods Provincial Park, will include 500 slot machines, five table games, and a pair of restaurants. Its owners believe that it’ll attract a substantial part of its business from gamblers from Winnipeg, a 100-mile drive east.

The above post originally appeared, in a slightly different form, in the March 2012 issue of the World Edition of the Golf Course Report.