South Shore Lake Tahoe gaming revenue plummets due to Caldor Fire

Nevada’s non-restricted gaming licensees reported a total “gaming win” of $1,158,168,180 for the month of September 2021, a gain of 41.07 percent over the same period in 2020. On the other end of things, the South Shore Lake Tahoe casinos win was down 77.24 percent over the same period with their gaming revenue of $5,643,377, according to the State's monthly gaming revenue report Wednesday.

The Caldor Fire forced evacuations of South Lake Tahoe and Stateline at the end of August, with US50 from Echo Summit to Camino closing before that on August 20. The highway didn't open for a month while residents started phased in repopulation before that.

Lake Tahoe was the only area in the state to have such drastic losses. North Lake Tahoe casinos saw an 11.06 percent drop in the "win" with their reported $2,088,706.

The "gaming win" represents the computed income of casinos before business expenses and taxes.

Even though they weren't open to customers, the Stateline casinos were open to feed and house first responders and others who responded to the fire.

Carson City and the Carson Valley's win was $10,638,019, up 7.77 percent from September 2020.

The big winners were casinos on the Las Vegas Strip. Their $640,632,577 was up 80.64 percent. One year ago casinos were still opening up after COVID-19 closures though South Shore casinos had been reopened for five months.

Meanwhile, casinos in Reno, Sparks, and other areas of Washoe County saw gaming-related revenue in the positive, with sparks climbing 23.11 percent, Reno, 12.99 percent, and the county, 28.34 percent.

The State has collected $336,829,091 in percentage fees to date for the fiscal year which began July 1.