Just as the annual AGA-generated 2016 revenue for the American Gaming Association by Meister Economic Consulting showed that Indian gaming revenues nationwide are higher than ever, Foxwoods Resort Casino reported a 10 percent drop in slots revenue, probably as a result of the opening of a rival casino in neighboring Massachusetts.
Its slots profits in October was $34.4 million, 10 percent less than the year before. There was a 5 percent decline the month before.
The Mohegan Sun has not yet reported its figures for October. However, for September it reported a 9 percent decline in slot revenue over 2017.
According to the Meister report Foxwoods and its longtime rival but current co-member of MMCT Venture generated $1.6 billion in revenues in 2016, which was about 5 percent higher than the year before.
The recent declines are very likely attributable to the opening in August of the MGM Springfield in Massachusetts. The tribes that operate the casinos, the Mashantucket Pequots and the Mohegans have long warned to expect this.
Meanwhile, the tribes are continuing their lawsuit against the Department of the Interior to try to force it to dislodge an approval for an amendment to one of the tribe’s gaming compacts with Connecticut that both tribes require before they can build and then open a $300 million satellite in East Windsor to try to deflect some of the draining of their residents towards the Bay State.
However, last week lawyers for the department filed a brief to try to prevent the tribe and the state of Connecticut from amending a previous lawsuit. A judge dismissed that lawsuit, so they are trying a second shot at it.
In the previous iteration, a federal judge ruled that the state and tribe didn’t have legal standing to require the department to act on the amended pact.
In the new filing the tribe argues that the department “buckled under undue political pressure” when it did not act on the tribe’s request. However, the department argues that it is only required to act in the case of “tribal-state compacts,” and that the pact the tribe sued over was arrived at in a process different from the normal tribal state gaming compact. The filing also argues that the tribe should have amended its lawsuit before the judge’s ruling in September.
