Reducing the stakes.

Byline: Joe Mosley The Register-Guard

It's been like trying to play a hand of blackjack at a Texas Hold 'em table.

Eugene officials say the city's 21-year-old social gaming rules don't begin to address the poker craze that is fueling games - which may or may not be legal - in bars and card rooms around town.

They propose a new ordinance, one that would clamp down on how much players can bet and restrict business earnings from poker.

"What (the existing ordinance) is set up for is for a group of friends to have fun and go to a bar, and have a friendly game of cards," says Sgt. Jerry Webber of the Eugene police vice and narcotics unit. "That's what the social gaming rules are set up as. But when (poker clubs) become profit-making, it is then illegal gambling, which is a felony."

Business people who run local poker games say they're willing to work with and be regulated by the city, but they object to rules that they say could put an end to their poker games.

"There's nobody on the (City) Council that has a real, legitimate understanding of the gaming and poker world today," says Justin Zinser, who owns Full House Poker at 808 Olive St. in downtown Eugene.

"The mind-set that it's still a back-alley (game) ... or a dangerous thing, just doesn't make sense," Zinser says. "I think they're taking away the choice of the players."

The city's proposal would eliminate all forms of "house" profit from the games, including the now-common practices of "raking" a portion of the pot in each hand dealt, taking a percentage each time players buy chips and charging for participation in poker tournaments. It also could outlaw house dealers, limit all bets to $2 and put a $100 cap on tournament buy-ins.

Zinser and others who run the games say they want the city to allow them to organize and monitor their own games, and to earn some profit beyond the food and drinks players may purchase.

"The Eldorado's been there a very long time," says a supervisor of the West 11th Avenue tavern's nighttime poker games, who goes by the nickname Sony but refuses to give her real name.

"More people are interested in poker now, and (city officials) are wanting to change the rules and everything," says Sony, who returned a phone message that was left for the club's owner, Mike Neria. "What they're offering right now, they're going to put us back in the closet, and in people's homes. That's going to make it hard for the city to manage it."

The Eldorado Club has been offering social games in one form or another since at least the mid-1980s, according to local officials.

Initially, it provided a good example of how social gaming ordinances were supposed to work when they were approved by several Oregon cities following authorization by the state Legislature in 1983, law enforcement officials say.

"Twenty years ago, the Eldorado ... was doing that," says Chief Deputy Lane County District Attorney Alex Gardner, who has worked with local police in monitoring current gambling activities. "They made their money off the food and drinks, and people went there to play cards."

That was during the days when blackjack was the game of choice, and a brief ordinance was all the regulation that was needed.

But Texas Hold 'em has soared in popularity over the past few years, fueled by televised tournaments aired by networks such as Bravo and ESPN.

First, a few local nightclubs began offering modest tournaments of their own. Then a couple began introducing cash games, in which players win or lose money with each hand rather than aiming to finish in the prize money at tournaments. Most recently, clubs such as Full House in downtown Eugene and the Royal Flush Poker Room at 2043 River Road have dedicated themselves almost exclusively to poker, whether tournaments or cash games.

And with regular dealers, wide-ranging betting limits, pot "rakes," tournament fees and other variables, the old blackjack-inspired rules have become inadequate to keep the action in line.

"The folks who are in business doing this are saying they can't really be in the gambling business anymore (if the proposed amendments are adopted)," Gardner says. "Well, I think the intention was to not have them in the gambling business. The (ordinance) was intended to allow social gaming, and prevent a Vegas-style house rake.

"It's hard to be sympathetic to businesses that are trying to carve out a living in an area where the City Council intended to prohibit doing so."

Sgt. Webber says the current gambling scene is difficult to regulate, at best.

When a dealer for a regular game at the Rock N Rodeo earlier this year reported what he believed to be gaming violations at the downtown Eugene nightclub, the owner was contacted and the questionable activities were stopped, Webber says.

Less cut-and-dried is the status of other clubs, whose activities appear to violate the existing city ordinance's prohibition on "house income from the operation of social games." But because it could be difficult to make a case based on such vague language, and because neither Eugene police nor the district attorney's office have the budget flexibility for an extensive investigation, apparent gaming violations found by Webber's unit have not been prosecuted.

"It's like drugs," Webber says. "It's hard for the DA to put these guys in jail. They no-file (decline to prosecute) a lot of our cases. But that doesn't mean we stop working the cases."

The issue has now made its way to the city manager's office. Police planner Linda Phelps has prepared an administrative order that would replace Eugene's existing one-page social gambling ordinance with a 3 1/2 -page version designed for today's most popular games.

The ordinance devotes a full section to "tournament-style social games," limiting buy-ins to $100 and prohibiting the collection of any fees from players. It also specifies that no individual bet may exceed $2.

"The thing that's really misunderstood about gaming is that people don't realize how regulated it is by the state," Phelps says. "Because Indian casinos have grown so much, people mistakenly believe gambling is basically legal."

Phelps says the amended ordinance was written under the strict guidelines of Oregon law, which prohibits gambling profits from going to nonplayers, and in cooperation with Springfield officials, whose own updated ordinance was adopted by the Springfield City Council a year ago.

The Springfield council is scheduled to vote tonight on an amendment that would eliminate provisions allowing organizers to charge a $5 fee for players to enter poker tournaments.

Eugene's amended ordinance is in a public comment period that expires next Monday. If no comments are received, it can be signed immediately by the city manager and adopted.

Zinser, the owner of Full House Poker, says his business may have an advantage over other card rooms because it operates as a private, members-only club. Memberships may be purchased for periods ranging from a month ($25) to a year ($100), and the club also sells water, juices and some snacks to players. No alcohol is served, and no smoking is allowed.

"There have never been any issues where we have caused any concern for the city," Zinser says. "It's a good, clean, safe environment."

But his business does charge fees for chip purchases and tournament buy-ins, and he says the elimination of those options would have a dramatic affect on all local poker rooms.

"Not charging for participation in tournaments - in that case we would simply not do tournaments," Zinser says. "And it would affect everyone in that way.

"Nobody's going to provide a service to 60 people (in a poker tournament) and do that as a charity. I think they're a little unrealistic."

But Zinser is optimistic that he may be able to work with the city staff to massage the proposed ordinance enough to make it workable, and to keep local poker clubs in business. He says his goals for the reworked ordinance will be to ensure fairness and consistency for players and an opportunity for business owners.

"I'm going to be sending in a response," he says. "And I'll go line item by line item."