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About Smoke signals. (Grand Ronde, Or.) 19??-current | View Entire Issue (July 1, 2008)
Smoke Signals 3 JULY 1,2008 Michael Boyce takes helm off Gaming Commission Interesting career includes work in pool hall, railroads and numerous casinos By Ron Karten Smoke Signals staff writer A word of advice, don't challenge Spirit Mountain Gaming Commis sion's new director, Michael Boyce, to a game of pool. Nobody's saying he's a hustler, but consider yourself forewarned. "My folks had a pool hall," Boyce, 54, says, "and the players used to take me around and teach me the game." For seven years, Boyce owned an "upscale billiard room" with a restau rant, bar and pro shop, and in his mid 30s he played pool professionally. Before that, he spent 16 years in a number of jobs with the Santa Fe Rail road. He started as a train dispatcher, which he describes as a job similar to that of air traffic controllers. While working for the railroad, he noticed that everybody who was advancing professionally had higher education degrees. So he spent six years going to college while working for the railroad and earned a bache lor's degree in finance and a master's in business administration. Boyce's casino career started dur ing a visit to his parent's home in Reno, Nev. He made the unusual choice of seeking work below his ability at casinos there. "I had the education," Boyce said, "and I thought, 'Let's try this out."' He started as a dealer. After he learned to deal blackjack and run a craps table, he progressed quickly through the ranks because of his '. WW 3 C ' Photo by Michelle Alaimo Michael Boyce is Spirit Mountain Casino's new Gaming Commission director. education, becoming an internal auditor and an accounting manager at casinos in Nevada. He went on to become casino con troller, doing financial and internal audits, at Kah-Nee-Ta High Desert Resort & Casino, the Warm Springs' casino in central Oregon. And just be fore coming to Grand Ronde, he was deputy director of the Muckleshoot Gaming Commission in Washington. His job included internal audits, surveillance, licensing, inspectors and enforcement. "I really enjoyed overseeing sur veillance," he says. "You could see the whole floor. It was satisfying, having that view and knowing what to look for." Boyce took over as director of Spirit Mountain Gaming Commission on May 27. "I was impressed with the broad range of knowledge he had in the gaming industry," said Tribal mem ber and Grand Ronde Gaming Com mission Chair Denise Harvey. "And his education. "I also thought that his personality will be a good fit with the Gaming Commission and his staff, as well as the industry people he will be in contact with regularly. "A broad range of skills are needed. He has them and he has a very good reputation in the industry. He under stands the whole operation." . . Boyce starts at the Grand Ronde Gaming Commission at a time when "the rate of change of technology" has to be the commission's highest priority. "It is changing," Boyce says, "from standalone machines to centralized determination and downloadable games." The industry is moving to a place where the games will be installed and monitored "from the back of the house," instead of switching chips in and out of individual machines. "In the future, it may all be done with software," he says. "Controls will be passwords. "As regulators, we're always trail ing the technology and the only answer is training." In a long, colorful career, he most vividly remembers a job he held with the railroad. "I was a drawbridge operator for a couple of years in the San Joaquin Delta (in northern California)," he says. "It was out over the water and I worked graveyard shift. There was nobody around for miles. Just the tules and the fog. And when the fog socked in, it was kind of eerie." Among Boyce's hobbies are long distance running. He ran in the Sacramento, Calif., marathon on his 50th birthday, and has competed in the Portland, Ore., marathon twice. Boyce is married with two grown sons and a daughter who just gradu ated from high school. The family has .. recently moved to West Salem. nn 4 m V m is asm Mvl9.2C08 flvl9 1 - iuKlyjSXriniA mxlMi 4 - , Ad created by Gorq Vaktp
