Sonoma, CA Gambling & Gaming: Card Room Licensing (2026)

010 for anyone to keep, conduct or maintain a house, room, apartment, stand or place used as a gambling house, or where a game not listed in Penal Code Section 330 is played with cards, dice or another device for money, checks, chips, credit or other valuable things. 030 bars any person from playing or betting at such a game. 040 carves out exemptions, including business prize contests, social games at gatherings held by churches, charities or fraternal organizations, and card games among members of an incorporated fraternal, labor or charitable club not open to the public.

Most notably for a cardroom operator, subsection E exempts a cardroom or card game carried on for business in territory annexed to the city on or before December 31, 1975, provided the cardroom had already been lawfully operating for at least a month before that date. Such a grandfathered cardroom remains subject to the city's jurisdiction to enact reasonable regulations, require a permit and charge fees, with the permit conditioned on the owner and operator signing a written agreement to abide by council-set regulations. The chapter dates to Ordinance 316 of 1962, with the annexation exemption added by Ordinance 76-1 in 1976.