Some people like the new skyline feature in Everett, the Encore Boston Harbor casino, and some look at the bronze-colored 27-story skyscraper “like an evil person watching over me,” according to a report in the Boston Globe. To others it simply looks like a typical feature of Las Vegas planted into what used to be a blighted landscape next to the Mystic River.
The $2.6 billion tower is unlikely to ever go away, but who ends up owning and running it is currently up in the air as the Massachusetts Gaming Commission is currently deliberating over whether the pull the gaming license of the Wynn Resorts over sexual allegations against former CEO and founder Steve Wynn—and more important to the commission—how the company dealt with those allegations, and whether what the new CEO and board claim is a totally changed corporate culture and way of dealing with sexual harassment claims is enough to allow the company to operate in the Bay State.
Nevertheless, according to the Globe report, a lot of people who don’t live in Everett, but who pass through the city on the Orange Line on their way to Boston or elsewhere, have strong opinions about the town, which some call “an eyesore,” although as comedian Steve Sweeney quipped, “It’s not exactly blocking trees or a beautiful waterfall. It’s freakin’ Everett.” Helicopter reporter Kristen Eck added, “Look at the other stuff around it — a power plant, a junkyard, an oil tank farm. It’s probably the most attractive thing in the neighborhood.”
Wynn Resorts spokesman Michael Weaver points out that the company originally submitted a design that wasn’t so “Las Vegas,” but that the commission asked that it be designed to look like something from that city. He adds, “It offers a beautiful reflection of its surroundings at night. And it creates a very warm, inviting glow inside the rooms.”
