Latest American Indian gambling ads target family life SACRAMENTO (AP) - Players in the American Indian gambling battle unveiled new television ads Friday designed to tap an emotional nerve as competi

In one ad, Donna Barron of the Pechanga Band of Luiseno Mission Indians says Proposition 5 - which seeks voter permission for California's 112 Indian tribes to build casinos on their land and offer other gambling without preconditions by the governor or the Legislature - is crucial to her way of life. Barren says she was raised in third-world conditions, but thanks to casinos, her children have a brighter future.

"Indian gaming has broken the cycle of poverty," she says, "and I've seen it firsthand."

Her counterpart, a suburban mother, frets over Proposition 5 while her children play catch in the backyard. The woman says she sympathizes with American Indians, but fears tribes will erect 100 new casinos exempt from local regulations.

"I want to help California Indians," the woman says, "but I'm voting no on Proposition 5."

The ads are the latest move in a heated war of words between a coalition of California tribes and a group of Nevada casinos, law enforcement groups and religious organizations. The tribes say the casinos are crucial to their economic survival, while their foes contend the proposition would lead to massive proliferation of unregulated gaming.

"We want Californians to know that it is perfectly appropriate to support tribal gaming and still vote no on Proposition 5," said Frank Schubert, a consultant for the Coalition Against Unregulated Gambling.

Dan Pellisier, a consultant for Californians for Indian Self-Reliance, said Proposition 5 was about regulatory battles.

"What this issue is really about is what Indian gaming has brought to the reservations," he said.

The two sides together are spending more than $1 million a week on television commercials in California's major media markets. The blitz comes earlier than in any other initiative campaign, except perhaps for 1988's auto insurance measure, Proposition 103 .

The Coalition Against Unregulated Gambling, a foe of Proposition 5, said Friday it was scaling back its media spending to around $200,000 a week. Proposition 5 backers, Californians for Indians for Self-Reliance, declined to comment on its media spending.

With the competing war chests of Nevada gambling interests and American Indian casinos - with 1997 net profits of $632 million - the campaigns are expected to spend a combined total of more than $75 million by Nov. 3.

Only 40 California tribes operate casinos, and initiative supporters say it is unlikely that many other tribes would open casinos because their reservations are in remote locations that would not support profitable gambling operations.

An additional 42 tribes are petitioning for rare federal recognition. Even if new tribes are recognized, the process of getting land and approval to build casinos would be arduous, proponents say.

But initiative foes say under current federal law, a tribe could purchase land anywhere and, with the approval of the secretary of interior and the governor, open a casino.

Measure supporters conceded that although it is possible that those two officials could agree, it would be unlikely if the casino proposals were controversial. Supporters also noted there are limitations on the kinds of land purchases tribes can make.

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