Game rooms in county cut nearly in half as ordinance forces closures, permit revocations, some owners giving up

Nearly half of the game rooms operating last year in Lubbock County are out of business, according to local officials. Documents LubbockLights.com requested and received from the county help to explain why.

Lubbock County adopted a game room ordinance in 2025 and amended it in February, which we covered here.

“The commissioners made no secret on the dais that they would like to close as many as possible,” said Ronnie Keister, tax assessor/collector for Lubbock County.

“What we all have to remember is that – exactly as the sheriff and the DA have said – gambling is illegal in Texas. This ordinance is trying to make sure that is not occurring,” Keister said.

Commissioner Jason Corley lobbied his fellow commissioners for the ordinance last year. Sheriff Kelly Rowe was skeptical of the approach but also no fan of game rooms – calling them “a den of scum and villainy.”

Keister’s staff issues and tracks the permits for game rooms.

“The ordinance’s purpose was to try to eliminate the bad activity. So as the ‘permit office’ all we get to do is get people to apply, get on the record who the owner is, make sure the employees that are working there don’t have criminal histories, make sure that there’s a security guard there and it’s as safe as possible,” Keister said.

Ordinance updated, then challenged

Neal Burt, the county’s civil division chief, asked the commissioners for the February amendment this year.

Among his suggestions – game rooms must remain in continuous operation. If a game room needs to close for more than seven days, the ownership must notify the county. Six game room permit revocations this year were for being “not in continuous operation” with proper notice.

Burt also suggested closing the grandfathering clause – meaning a permit holder cannot sell the business to someone else.

In addition to Burt’s suggested changes, commissioners approved one more change to cut down operating time for game rooms to 45 hours per week.

That was challenged by the El Fronteriso game room in a lawsuit and a temporary court order allows game rooms in Lubbock County to operate 12 hours a day, seven days a week.

The owner of El Fronteriso, Eric Thompson, offered only limited comments to LubbockLights.com – in part because his lawsuit against the county is still pending.

He closed El Fronteriso in April, he said (but hopes to reopen).

“The reasons I closed is to prevent any other escalation against us prior to the forfeiture hearing [in court],” Thompson said.

Thompson also has ongoing court cases – property forfeiture hearings – for items officers took from his business during a search warrant. Thompson and one employee of El Fronteriso were charged with misdemeanors in February. The criminal cases were dropped last month. The property forfeiture issues are still pending.

“We are reopening since the forfeiture trial got delayed again. So, I’m going to be reopening on the 18th,” Thompson said.

A citizen board

One of the changes this year to the game room ordinance was the formation of a citizen board to hear evidence whenever a permit is revoked or denied.

Keister said, “We had that amendment to make a citizen board so that if one of the game rooms or employees wanted to appeal the denial of their permit … they could do that to this citizen board.

The board met for the first time on May 19.

“I thought it went pretty well,” Keister said.

The board is seven people but meets with just three. That allows the county to spread the work out across more people.

If the board agrees with the rejection of a permit, the case can be appealed to district court. That hasn’t happened yet, Keister said.

Keister’s office can also fine game rooms for violations of the ordinance, but so far the penalty has been denial or revocations. No fines yet.

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