Construction on South Sioux City casino may begin next year

The opening of the Hard Rock in downtown Sioux City a decade ago ate into the revenues of the WinnaVegas Casino Resort near Sloan. WinnaVegas, owned by the Winnebago Tribe of Nebraska, had opened 22 years earlier.

Ho-Chunk, the tribe’s economic development arm, tried in vain to get in on the ground floor of the casino action in metro Sioux City. In 2012, the Iowa Racing and Gaming Commission invited developers, paired with nonprofit partners, to submit proposals for Sioux City’s first casino on dry land. A Ho-Chunk-led group pitched a $110 million project that called for renovating the historic Warrior Hotel, which at the time had been empty for decades. 

In 2013, the IRGC granted the state gaming license to the Hard Rock group, spearheaded by a Las Vegas-based developer and the nonprofit Missouri River Historical Development.  

After that defeat, Ho-Chunk led the long, arduous process of getting casino gambling legalized in Nebraska, partnering with the state’s moribund horse-racing industry in a mutually beneficial arrangement that would breathe life back into the tracks. In 2012, Ho-Chunk purchased the dying-but-still-licensed Atokad racetrack in South Sioux City, and later unveiled its vision for a proposed $30 million casino and entertainment venue, which was contingent on getting casinos legalized. Races were held at Atokad once a year to maintain the license. 

In 2020, Nebraska voters finally gave their blessing to casino gaming at the state’s horse tracks. Now, four years later, things are starting to fall into place for the Sioux City metro’s newest casino. 

“We have every intention of taking a bite out of the Hard Rock, ’cause they’ve been doing it to us for a long time,”  Ho-Chunk CEO Lance Morgan told the Journal in an interview late last month.

Morgan has stressed repeatedly that Ho-Chunk, through its WarHorse Gaming subsidiary, has been plowing all its capital and energy into the casinos in the state’s two largest metros; WarHorse has invested $400 million into casinos at tracks in Omaha and Lincoln. With those sites now up and running and generating revenue, the time has come to shift its attention to South Sioux City, Morgan said. 

“They’ve (Hard Rock) got a reprieve, because we’ve been focusing on Omaha and Lincoln — but we are going to build it, and we are going to take back market share,” Morgan said.

Moving the Atokad racetrack from its longtime site, just east of Highway 75/77, is the first order of business. WarHorse has acquired land in an undeveloped area of South Sioux City for a new gaming complex. The site is south of Interstate 129, not far from the Dakota Avenue interchange. The race track will be built east of G street, while casino will be on the west side of G Street. 

“We’re going to start building the track, as soon as the weather breaks in the spring — the first thing we’re going to build is a 5/8 mile racetrack,” he said. Races at the new track, he said, should start in August or September. 

Construction on the casino, Morgan said, should begin in the fall of 2025 or possibly the spring of 2026, with an opening targeted sometime in 2026. 

The casino details are still in the early stages. Morgan said the South Sioux City casino, like the Omaha and Lincoln casinos, will be built in phases. The casino will, he said, have a hotel and dining options attached. And it will be a costly undertaking. 

“Even a small casino is about a $60 million-plus investment,” he said. 

Morgan acknowledged that the South Sioux City casino will, ironically, probably draw some bettors away from the tribal-owned WinnaVegas. 

“Sioux City is a very crowded gaming market, including our tribe’s WinnaVegas,” he said. “And this will impact WinnaVegas slightly.”