Gaming Commission must also sign off on licensees
It’s the moment many New Yorkers have been waiting for. On Wednesday, December 17, the state’sfive-member Gaming Facilities Location Board is expected to announce who it believes should get up to four Class III casino licenses in the state.
Voters approved commercial casinos in a 2013 statewide referendum. In Phase I of the development, three economically challenged regions in the state were chosen to host up to four casinos: the Capital District, the Catskills/Hudson Valley region, and the Southern Tier.
A total of 16 bidders includes the big guns?Genting, Mohegan Sun, Hard Rock and Caesars Entertainment Corp.?as well as smaller bidding partnerships, such as Greenetrack, an Alabama bingo operator; Wilmorite, a real estate company near Rochester; and Howe Caves Development, a group that wants to build a casino at a natural cavern in Schoharie County.
Several racetrack operators are also in the running: Saratoga Casino and Raceway, which entered two bids, in Orange County and the Capital District; and Tioga Downs Racetrack, which has proposed adding a casino to its property in Nichols, Tioga County.
According to innovategaming.com, Mohegan Sun, which has bid for a license in the Catskills with developer Louis Cappelli, has already moved bulldozers to its site, awaiting the go-ahead from state regulators.
“We’re actually steel-ready, meaning we can have foundations completed and a steel frame of the casino and hotel in the ground in a week’s time,” Bryan Cappelli, the developer’s son, told the New York Times.
To sweeten the pot and increase its chances of winning, the Mohegan team promised to earmark 0.5 percent of its gross gaming revenue to promote tourism in the region. “This fund will provide critical financial resources to market and promote all of the assets of the Catskills as a true regional tourist destination,” the company said in a statement.
Other bidders have also pledged big money for their proposed host communities. Hard Rock and developer David Flaum, who have proposed a casino in Rensselaer on the Hudson River, have promised $11 million to the city of Albany if it gets the OK. According to the Albany Times-Union, that’s resulted in lots of local support for the $280 million project; a group of 30 politicians from Albany, Rensselaer, Saratoga, Columbia and Washington counties recently signed a letter of support for the project.
“This is the turning point for the city of Rensselaer,” said Rensselaer Mayor Dan Dwyer.
And Wilmorite says it has already “tentatively awarded $31 million” in contracts for site work, foundations and steel, the Times reported.
As eager as the developers are to build casinos, opponents are just as committed to keep them from being built. Environmentalists reserve special ire for the Genting project, a billion-dollar casino resort proposed for private land set in a public forest. If the project is approved, a coalition of forces has promised to rise up in opposition, including the Sterling Forest Partnership, the Sierra Club North Jersey, the Friends of Sterling Forest, the Appalachian Mountain Club and the Rockland County Water Coalition, among others.
Though the siting panel may recommend up to four licensees, an explosion of casino development in the northeastern U.S.?and the startling example of decline in nearby Atlantic City?may cause the members to recommend fewer than four licenses.
And the prospects for another three casino resorts in New York, also approved in the referendum for Phase II of development, now seem more remote than ever.
The recommendations made by the siting panel also must be vetted and approved by the state gaming commission.
