STANDISH, Mich. -- These are dark economic times for Michigan, but it was a sunny day Monday morning for city and county governments and some school districts in Arenac County.

The Saginaw Chippewa Indian Tribe handed out money from its Saganing Eagles Landing Casino to local municipalities.

This is the second distribution since the casino opened less than a year ago.

One by one, neighbors of the Saganing Eagles Landing Casino went up to retrieve their allocation.

The tribe parceled out 2 percent of its take for the second time this year.

This time around, it distributed about $738,000 to local governments and schools.

A tribal council decides how much money from the casino cut goes to each governmental entity.

For example, Standish will buy a new police patrol cruiser with its $33,000.

Turner Township received a jackpot of $50,000 and most of that will go to a road project.

The casino lit up local schools, as the educational institutions received $258,000 of the total mandated allocation.

The next round of payments will come in the spring of 2009 and the tribe will announce its allocation from the Soaring Eagle Casino later this week.