Employee hours reduced

Jeremy Deutsch - Kamloops This Week Published: March 03, 2009

Employees at the Lake City Casino in downtown Kamloops will see their hours reduced this week, but the company insists there are no plans for layoffs. In its decision to reduce employee hours, Lake City Casino is noting a drop in business from the same time last year. Though current economic conditions are partly to blame, Jeff Pascoe, vice-president of operations for Lake City Casinos, said the decision to reduce hours is partially related to the closure of the Executive Inn hotel due to a fire last year. He said the casino isn’t getting the hotel traffic on which it relies. While the Great Canadian Gaming Corporation, which operates a number of casinos in the Lower Mainland, announced layoffs in January, Lake City Casinos said it has no plans to follow suit. “There’s no question there’s going to be people with reduced hours and that kind of thing, but are we doing a mass layoff? No,” Pascoe said. Instead, Pascoe said, the schedule changes may only be temporary, as the company expects business to ramp up when the summer tourism season begins.

Employees at all four Lake City Casinos in the Okanagan, including Kelowna, Vernon and Penticton, will see a reduction in hours. “Yes, we are responding to an economic down-cycle, but I don’t think this is a long-term situation for us,” Pascoe said. The company is still planning to build a new 45,000 square-foot casino at the corner of Fifth Avenue and Lansdowne Street. Pascoe noted Lake City Casinos has had great co-operation from their employees’ union to minimize the impact of the changes.