Having entered into an agreement with the City of South Bend to make an annual contribution to the community, the Pokagon Band of Potawatomi is committed to serving and developing South Bend. Beyond this tax agreement, Pokagon Band joined with Four Winds Casinos to give a generous total of $860,000 to local non-profit organizations.
“This is separate from the agreement about payment in lieu of taxes that goes to the city,” said City of South Bend Mayor James Mueller. “We get that money every year as part of the partnership, and then the Pokagon Band also wanted to be a good member of the South Bend community and has been donating to various organizations, including the City of South Bend, over the past four years.”
On January 26, these donations were presented to the following organizations and projects:
- The Boys & Girls Clubs of St. Joseph County ($20,000)
- The Food Bank of Northern Indiana ($20,000)
- The YWCA of North Central Indiana ($25,000)
- Jobs for America’s Graduates Indiana ($50,000)
- Beacon Health Foundation ($100,000)
- The Bowman Creek Project ($100,000)
- The South Bend Community School Corporation ($100,000)
- South Bend Venues, Parks & Arts ($445,000)
“Those are wonderful programs,” said Sheila Niezgodski, councilwoman of the 6th District in South Bend. “You can see they very intentionally selected the ones that will have a huge impact on the community. The Pokagon Band of Potawatomi has made it very clear that they are not only great neighbors but very generous in supporting the community.”
Through these donations, Pokagon Band and Four Winds Casinos will aid low-income seniors, crisis service programs, academic enrichment, pediatric care, environmental sustainability, and more.
Tribal Council Chairman and CEO of the Pokagon Gaming Authority Rebecca Richards is proud of how this donation will impact a rich variety of people in the community through these worthy causes.
“It's great to be a partner in this community to give back something to the City of South Bend for all of the great work that this community is doing in all of these agencies and organizations and if we can help those organizations; it feels so good to be able to do that. The partnerships also will service not only the citizens of South Bend but also where our tribal citizens live and hopefully have an impact on both,” Richards said.
During the check presentation ceremony, Clayton Mason, CFO of Four Winds Casinos, touched on another development in the works: a 23-story hotel tower on the property of Four Winds South Bend.
The hotel tower will boast 317 rooms, more than 80 suites, a convention center, a ballroom, a pool, a bar and grill, and more. These amenities also come with a view of the entire city from atop the tower. This project will be completed in the spring of 2023, and in the meantime, it will create new jobs for hundreds of workers.
“This expansion is a milestone for the Pokagon Band and for Four Winds, and it demonstrates a little part of our continued, ongoing commitment to develop the community,” Mason said. “This project has added 270 construction jobs and we anticipate we will be adding somewhere between 350 and 400 more jobs through the course of this. We are very, very excited about the hiring initiative that will be starting up here in the next few months to start that wave of bringing in more of the Four Winds employees so that we can continue to deliver excellence in the community.”
Whether it is a donation to expand on pediatric care at Beacon Health Foundation or the construction of a 23-story hotel tower, Mueller is grateful for the developments aided generously by Pokagon Band and Four Winds Casinos.
“From the beginning, Pokagon Band said they want to be integral with South Bend and be a part of the community, and here we are three years later. Not only do we have the casino, but we have the hotel going up and we have all of this shared interest across South Bend," he said.
To learn more about the donations and developments happening at Four Winds Casinos, visit its website here.
