Nielson Brothers Polling squeezes one more bit of fun out of their late October poll of Sioux Falls voters. NBP asked whether folks had visited the new Grand Falls Casino just across the border by Larchwood, Iowa. 44% said they'd visited at least once. 24% said they'd given the Iowegians repeat business (really? losing your money is that enjoyable?).
Bob Mercer, of course, will shortly be upbraiding all of you treasonous traveling gamblers for taking your dollars out of your community and not helping your local entrepreneurs pay their taxes.
NBP finds an interesting disconnect in prediction and reality. Back in May, before the casino's grand opening, NBP found the over-65 crowd expressing the least inclination to go gamble in Larchwood. But the senior lunch special must be working: NBP's sample finds the highest Grand Falls attendance among old folks. The least frequent visitors: my demographic, the 30&ndash45 set, who are spending all their gambling cash on mortgages and food and clothes for the kids.
Below is NBP's summary of its Grand River findings:
Five months after the opening of Grand Falls, 44 percent of Sioux Falls voters say they have visited the Iowa casino. In its October Survey, Nielson Brothers Polling asked Sioux Falls voters about their attendance at the resort that opened near Larchwood in June. While 20 percent of respondents say they have visited a single time, 18 percent say they have visited between two and four times, and 6 percent say more than five times. The remaining 56 percent claim not to have visited.
In a previous survey conducted in May, NBP had asked Sioux Falls voters how often they planned to visit Grand Falls Casino. Half of respondents said they would make the trip at least once, while another half said they would never visit. In the same May Poll, respondents over 65 years showed least inclination to visit -- 62 percent answered "never". However, in the October survey, respondents 65 years and older showed highest attendance of all age groups, with 50 percent saying they had visited the casino at least once. On the other hand, respondents between 30 and 45 years old were least likely to visit, with only 39 percent visiting at least once.
NBP surveyed a random selection of Sioux Falls residents likely to vote in municipal elections from October 26 to October 27, 2011. The question on Grand Falls Casino drew 536 respondents, with a margin of error of 4.23 percent, with a 95 percent confidence level [Nielson Brothers Polling, press release, 2011.11.30].
Boycott South Dakota: http://rapidcityjournal.com/news/trooper-seizes-pounds-of-pot-over-thanksgiving-weekend/article_7ef953b6-1a3a-11e1-a8d5-001cc4c002e0.html?mode=story
Stupid state.
Cory,
I looked at the polling results and found them interesting. I came close to posting about them but decided the sub-samples leave a lot open to possible error. I'm not saying they are in error, but the margin for error greatly increases as the sub-sample size decreases. Heck, on Thanksgiving Day, I mistakenly scratched off a SD Lottery ticket that I thought was mine and actually was meant for our daughter. I hit a winner on all 10 spots. She was happy because she never wins. Her bigger sub-sample suggests one thing (that the scratch tickets are never winners); my very, very small sub-sample (that single ticket) suggests that scratch tickets are always winners. Of course, the truth falls in between. But, the Lottery will have no winners or losers if everybody heads to Larchwood. Same for the NBP sub-samples. The math aces out there perhaps can tell us the much-larger sample size necessary to bring the poll's demographic sub-samples into the 4 percent margin of error range.