One-armed bandits are all about dinero, and lots of lucre will reach state coffers and a tribe's treasury under an amended compact between California and the Shingle Springs Band of Miwok Indians.

In exchange for state permission to run as many as 5,000 slots at the coming Red Hawk Casino, the tribe agreed July 1 to share slot-machine revenue to the tune of approximately 22.5 percent, the largest share yet agreed to by any California gaming-operator tribe. The share will slide b3etwen 20 and 25 percent in a compact binding until 2029. The casino will open in December near Shingle Springs with just 2,000 slots, but now has state permission to expand.

Strenuous negotiations ended with smiles on the faces of Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and tribal officials John Tayaba and Nicholas and Catherine Fonseca in a signing ceremony July 1 at the State Capitol.

"The best part is it's over," Tayaba said. "We can move on."

Calling the arrangement "a good deal" for both tribe and state, Schwarzenegger said "the agreement will provide significant revenue to the state, protections for both workers and patrons, and mitigation for the off-reservation impacts of gaming."

Red Hawk Casino will employ approximately 1,750 people and run a variety of games of chance. The state compact, applying only to slot machines, is the second important money agreement around the casino struck by the Miwok band with non-tribal governments. The Miwok band also will pay El Dorado County nearly $200 million during the first 20 years of casino operation to fund law enforcement, highway expansion and to offset other effects of expected heavy casino patronage. Under that agreement, when the slot-machine number expands beyond 2,000, the tribe will pay the county $100,000 per additional 100 machines.

The Miwok band will also pay $4.6 million per year into a state fund that distributes some Indian-casino revenues to tribes in the state that lack a casino or run only a small gaming facility.

The Telegraph’s Roger Phelps can be reached at rogerp@goldcountrymedia.com, or post a comment at folsomtelegraph.com