City Manager Urges Council Not to Deal on Card Room Limits

Based on an undercover police investigation that alleges widespread criminal activity in San Diego’s card rooms, the city manager’s office has recommended that no changes be made in the current restrictions on the gambling parlors.

The report, issued last week, recommends that the City Council allow no increase in card room hourly table fees charged to patrons, eliminate no laws that prevent the card rooms from transferring ownership or changing locations and not remove the “sunset clause” that is designed to close all but a handful of card rooms by 1995. Only those owners who had business licenses before 1983 can keep their card rooms open, and ownership cannot be transferred after they die.

There once were more than 100 card rooms in San Diego, but increasingly restrictive city ordinances have closed all but 13 of them.

Police have long said that card rooms are havens for bookmaking, loan sharking, drugs, fencing of stolen goods and other illegal activities.

Card room operators have disputed the allegations and requested an easing of restrictions, including raising the hourly table fee from $2.50 to $5.

No date has been set, but the council, which has regulated card rooms since the 1940s, is scheduled to discuss the issue and the city manager’s recommendation this month.