Tuesday, March 26, 2002 | 9:47 a.m.
BOONVILLE, Mo. -- When a gambling "riverboat" rests in a manmade moat instead of rolling on a river, there are special challenges -- such as controlling algae in the standing water.
So this spring, the Isle of Capri Casino at Boonville is stocking its seven-foot-deep moat -- filled amid fanfare from a city fire hydrant -- with algae-gobbling catfish and grass carp.
"We want to keep the moat looking clear and clean," casino spokeswoman Traci Stiles says. A clean moat would better complement the neon-and-pastel color scheme at Isle of Capri, where the Caribbean "Isle Style" design concept was modified to add fake riverboat smokestacks and bulging sides evoking paddlewheels.
This is life on -- well, near -- the Mississippi and Missouri rivers nearly a decade after voters first endorsed legalizing riverboat casinos. Court cases and costly elections to revise the Missouri Constitution have moved casinos physically away from the big rivers and symbolically far from Mark Twain-style nostalgia.
"All you need now is a big swimming pool to float your boat," said Kevin Mullally, executive director of the Missouri Gaming Commission, which regulates and licenses the floating casinos. "But it's well within the law -- even if there is a disconnect between reality and what voters think they voted for."
Including the November 1992 balloting in which 62 percent of voters first endorsed legalizing riverboat gambling, Missourians conducted four statewide votes about the legal status of floating casinos during a six-year span. There have also been local votes on hosting casino boats.
The latest statewide vote was in 1998, when the constitution's wording was changed by citizens -- through an amendment written by casino companies -- to retroactively legalize half a dozen operations that had dug moats near the rivers. The casinos had cited safety concerns, echoed by the Coast Guard, about actually cruising on the major shipping channels.
The gambling companies said they had played by state Gaming Commission rules in digging their ponds, spending millions on construction only to have the Missouri Supreme Court later declare the moats unconstitutional. The casino industry bankrolled the 1998 campaign for Amendment 9, which received 55 percent of the vote.
That amendment dumped a voter-approved requirement that gambling boats sit "on" the rivers and allowed them to rest in water -- presumably from any source -- within 1,000 feet of the waterways. Critics called this a ladder strategy, moving further from 1992's visions of quaint excursion boats toward land-based casino gambling.
The Gaming Commission's Mullally said one effect of Amendment 9 was that "these boats can now sit on one inch of tap water from the city water system rather than on the rivers."
Since Amendment 9's approval, amusing scenarios have arisen. For example, the Mark Twain Casino in LaGrange, which opened last year as northeast Missouri's only gambling boat, is hundreds of yards from the Mississippi River, with U.S. 61 and several fishing shacks on stilts between the casino and the river.
The Mark Twain Casino rests on water, sure enough, but its moat is mostly concealed. Many gamblers aren't aware when they cross its turnstiles that they are stepping onto a barge because there isn't any discernible wave motion. Boats in moats in Kansas City and St. Louis are similarly designed for smooth gambling free of seasickness.
At Boonville, Isle of Capri's casino barge rests in a 446-foot-by-160-foot basin with a 300,000-gallon capacity. The facility's gift shop, three restaurants and administrative offices are in a two-story land-based building, sort of a cabana for the big pool.
There is no visible gangplank; wall-to-wall carpeting splashed with a colorful palm-leaf pattern makes it all look seamless, although the weight of a capacity crowd of just over 2,000 aboard the gambling barge can mean a sharp step down upon entry.
Part of the amusement is that gamblers scarcely notice.
Visiting Boonville from Muscatine, Iowa, Kelly Cunningham was convinced that Isle of Capri was on dry land.
"I know there is the Missouri River, but it's way over there," she said with a sweeping gesture. In Boonville's case, "over there" means across railroad tracks that lie between the casino and the river.
When a reporter pointed out the moat, Cunningham, 32, was miffed. "Isn't this the home state of Mark Twain?" she asked. "That just seems kind of degrading to his legend. It's bogus."
Van Harris, 76, a retired dry cleaner from Kansas City, just laughs about boats in moats.
A regular at Isle of Capri, he said: "Why, I don't think they would care if it was out there in a great big tent. Folks just come to gamble."
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