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Most casino profits end up in shareholders’ accounts. In Dubuque, Iowa, they help fund a food pantry, a youth soccer training facility and the Field of Dreams movie site.
Q Casino + Resort isn’t run by a publicly traded gaming company. The Dubuque Racing Association, a nonprofit, holds the license for the city-owned casino and operates it. Its purpose is to send casino revenue back into the tri-state area of Iowa, Illinois and Wisconsin rather than out to investors.
That revenue comes from people gambling, which is why responsible gambling matters as much as the grants it funds. After covering operating costs, the DRA directs the money to the city, to development projects and, most visibly, to grants for area nonprofits.
This year, that giving added up to more than $1.5 million. On July 28, the DRA announced $1,261,154.50 in core grants to 64 nonprofit and governmental organizations, chosen from 152 applications that requested more than $7.59 million. Four of the 64 are second-year payments on multiyear grants. Organizations in Iowa received 88.3% of the money, with 8.3% going to Wisconsin and 3.3% to Illinois.
In June, the DRA announced $250,000 in mission grants for three projects:
- $100,000 for a new Dubuque Soccer Club youth training facility
- $100,000 to Dyersville Events for a professional baseball stadium at the Field of Dreams site in Dyersville, Iowa, renewable for up to five years
- $50,000 for Wanderwood Gardens, a children’s garden run by the Butler Children’s Garden Foundation, the second installment of a previously approved commitment
Together, the two rounds total more than $1.5 million for 67 organizations.
Lori Thielen, chair of the DRA board, said the demand for funding “continues to demonstrate the incredible work being done throughout our region.”
How Dubuque’s nonprofit casino works
Iowa requires every casino to have a nonprofit sponsor. What sets Q Casino apart is that the DRA doesn’t just hold the license and collect a cut while a commercial operator runs the floor. It runs the casino itself.
That distinction matters. Diamond Jo Casino, also in Dubuque, is owned by Boyd Gaming, a publicly traded company. The DRA is Diamond Jo’s co-licensee and sponsoring nonprofit and receives a share of its revenue. Q Casino has no commercial operator.
The DRA didn’t start out running a casino. It formed in 1984, when a group of Dubuque residents pitched a dog track as a way to rebound from an unemployment rate that had peaked at 23%. Voters approved a $7.9 million bond, and Dubuque Greyhound Park opened in June 1985. The DRA paid off the bond in 1991, 14 years ahead of schedule. Greyhound racing ended in 2022. What remains is Q Casino, still running on the nonprofit model.
Where casino revenue goes in Dubuque
Under a 2022 lease with the city, the DRA splits its annual distribution equally among the city, nonprofit grants and development of Chaplain Schmitt Island, where the casino sits, the Telegraph Herald reported.
Since 1985, the DRA says it has generated more than $1 billion in economic impact, a measure that includes gaming taxes. It says more than $257 million has gone to the city of Dubuque over that time, counting taxes, rent and annual distributions, according to its 2025 annual report.
City documents showed Dubuque expected to collect $7.4 million from the casino in fiscal year 2025, which works out to about $216 off each homeowner’s annual property tax bill, KCRG reported in June 2025. Thielen told the station the money helps keep taxes down and pays for parks and trails, at a time when residents face rising costs for groceries and schooling.
The nonprofit grants are the more visible piece. The DRA has supported more than 1,500 organizations since 1985 and says its grants total more than $68 million, according to its July announcement. They span education, health and human services, arts and culture, veterans programs and emergency services.
Grant requests far outpace available funding
Nonprofit ownership might sound like a recipe for thinner margins and a shakier business. The DRA’s record suggests otherwise. It paid off its original track bond 14 years early, according to its timeline, and this year’s grants are about 29% higher than the $1.17 million it awarded in 2025, according to the annual report.
Anthony Williams, the DRA’s president and CEO, said in the July announcement that every guest who visits the properties helps make the grants possible.
Demand is outrunning the money. This year’s core grant requests totaled about six times what the DRA awarded: $7.59 million requested against $1.26 million.
If the model has a limit, it isn’t a shortage of ideas for where the money should go. Grant totals depend largely on casino revenue, and that revenue has to stretch as everyone from soccer clubs to baseball stadiums asks for a share. Even the mission grants announced in June covered just three projects.
Few casinos work this way. The Iowa Gaming Association lists Q Casino as one of two in the state operated as nonprofit corporations, and the Telegraph Herald has called it one of only two nonprofit casinos in the US. Most casinos exist to pay shareholders. This one exists to fund the next round of applicants.
