Towers Casino Grass Valley California
GRASS VALLEY (CBS13) — The Towers Casino and Card Room in Nevada County says six Department of Justice agents shut them down Tuesday night for violating the state’s public health order. Owner Jamey Robinson says there was no indication from Nevada County Department of Public Health or local law enforcement that she was doing anything wrong. GRASS VALLEY, Calif. (KTXL) — Special agents shut down Towers Casino and Card Room Tuesday night in Grass Valley after the business pressed its luck with reopening against the governor’s orders.
Shut down by the coronavirus pandemic for two full months, one Northern California card room is taking a gamble.
Towers Casino in Nevada County appears to be California’s first non-tribal gambling establishment to reopen for business amid the COVID-19 crisis, doing so at the start of this week in violation of the statewide stay-at-home mandate.
The card room, located just off Highway 49 in the center of Grass Valley, announced Monday on its website and social media pages that it is back open “after 62 days of closure” and is “following the strictest environmental health guidelines to ensure the safety and welfare of our employees and patrons.”
A pop-up message on Towers Casino’s website lists sanitation measures and social distancing protocols being put into place, which include “rigorous disinfecting” and “stringent sanitizing” of cards and casino chips “before and after usage.” The announcement does not specifically mention COVID-19 or the coronavirus.
The decision to reopen appears to defy Gov. Gavin Newsom’s stay-at-home order, which has recently been loosened in a number of ways for restaurants and retailers throughout many parts of the state, but not yet for any of California’s card rooms or gambling halls, even with modifications.
Nevada County’s public health office earlier this month allowed its own county-level stay-at-home order to expire, but pointed out in an FAQ page on its website that county residents and businesses still must abide by the statewide order, which it notes is mandatory.
Towers includes a six-table poker room plus tables for California blackjack, a variant of the game that is legal in the state’s card rooms.
The message from management says it will allow a smaller number of players into the facilities; will implement social distancing measures at the tables, though the exact measures are not specified on the website; will require face masks or shields for all staff and patrons; and that it will stop offering communal food and self-serve coffee.
Photos of Monday’s poker action posted by Towers to Instagram shows guests wearing masks or bandannas, but no social distancing measures can be seen. The one table shown is at its usual capacity — nine players plus one dealer, seated in an oval with about a foot or two of space between each of them. In one photo, one of the players takes off his mask to sip from a beer bottle while seated at the table.
Owner Jamey Robinson did not immediately respond to requests for comment Tuesday.
Towers Casino Grass Valley California Map
The governor recently urged tribal leaders, who operate casinos on land that is considered sovereign and thus not under Newsom’s or California’s legal jurisdiction, to postpone early reopening, which he said “deeply concerns” him.
Towers in Grass Valley, though, is not sovereign; it is among more than 70 card rooms licensed by the state. California card rooms are overseen by both the Gambling Control Commission, which deals mainly with licensing and policy issues; and the state attorney general office’s Bureau of Gambling Control, which deals with enforcement and investigates complaints related to card rooms.
Commission spokesman Fred Castano said card rooms are “categorized as Stage 3,” referring to Newsom’s four-phase plan for the gradual reopening of nonessential businesses that have been shut down since the stay-at-home order was issued March 19.
Phase 3 businesses, which are considered to represent a higher risk for virus transmission, have not been cleared by the governor’s office to open in any of the state’s 58 counties.
Castano deferred to the bureau and attorney general’s office for further comment about Towers Casino.
“To protect its integrity, we are unable to comment on, even to confirm or deny, a potential or ongoing investigation,” the state AG’s office said in an emailed response to The Sacramento Bee.
Phase 3 of California’s reopening plan would include personal services like barbershops and salons that require close physical proximity; entertainment venues like movie theaters and card rooms that bring moderate-sized crowds into one room; and the resumption of professional sports, minus spectators. It could be phased in at different speeds for different parts of the state, as Phase 2 was, and Newsom suggested Monday that salons could be “weeks” away from being allowed to reopen.
Towers Casino Grass Valley California Homes For Sale

Towers Casino is licensed by the California Gambling Control Commission, and its license has not faced any recent administrative action by the commission.
There are 73 licensed card rooms in California. Towers is among five listed by the state Bureau of Gambling Control as being in the Northern California area. Eleven more are in the separate Sacramento region, which it defines as Amador, Calaveras, El Dorado, Placer, Sacramento and Yolo counties.
———
©2020 The Sacramento Bee (Sacramento, Calif.)
Visit The Sacramento Bee (Sacramento, Calif.) at www.sacbee.com
Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.