Long story why they closed... Here is the short version. In Iowa a gaming licensee needs to have a non profit partner. IRGC (Iowa Racing and Gaming Commission) a few years back ruled that the licensee and the non profits could re-negotiate their split. Penn National and their non profit could not agree on a new split and they decided to divorce. Penn National found a new non profit. Then IRGC ruled that the old not profit had a right to be linked with a gaming licensee, so they put the Sioux City license up for rebid. - This has never been done before in the gaming industry and sent shock-waves throughout the industry, a casino that did not have any major violations, good operation now was up for rebid and ended up losing it's license.

There were 4 contenders for the Sioux City license including Penn National with a new land based Hollywood casino. However the winner of the license was Warner Gaming that licensed to use the Hard Rock name. The non profit with Warner Gaming happens to be the non profit that was with Penn National before the dispute. The non profit has some political pull.

Argosy closed last Wednesday (but they did fight in court) and the Hard Rock opened last Friday at 8PM. You can possibly find all the related atricles in the local Sioux City paper.

http://siouxcityjournal.com/