This month marks five years since the first casino opened in Ohio.
The Hollywood Casino in Toledo, along with the casinos in Columbus, Cleveland and Cincinnati, the Buckeye State’s give largest cities, were authorized after 1.7 million voters approved of a state constitutional amendment.
At the time, there were expansive predictions of how much tax revenues would be generated by the new casinos, and of the aid that would be earmarked for the state’s 88 counties and its schools.
In 2009 the University of Cincinnati projected that the casinos would create “nearly $11 billion in total economic impacts and more than $4 billion in fiscal revenues for the state of Ohio during construction and the first five years of operation.”
Today the question of whether the vote was a plus or a minus for the state is controversial.
The mayor of Rossford, Neil MacKinnon III, continues to be a supporter of gaming, and points to a planned $85 million entertainment district, and several eateries that he said would have been impossible without the Toledo casino. The district will include a hotel and convention center, dining and retail shops. The district will be connected to the casino by an aerial gondola.
The access road is complete and although the district is still seeking tenants, construction is expected to start next summer and be completed several years later.
MacKinnon, noting that supporters of the 2009 ballot initiative promised economic development, told the Toledo Blade, “It’s happening now.”
Meantime, revenue from the four casinos is steady, although about half of what was originally projected. For the Toledo casino, which is owned by Penn National Gaming, that was $191,610,636, compared to $183,366,380, after the first full year of operation.
Of taxes the casinos pay, 5 percent goes to the host city, 34 percent to the county student fund, 51 percent, 3 percent to the Casino Control Commission fund, 3 percent for horseracing, 2 percent to law enforcement training and 2 percent to fight gambling addiction.
The city of Toledo has found its share of casino money to be steady and reliable. It was $5,692,000 in 2013 and was $5,647,422 in 2016 and looks to be at least that by the end of this year.
The Jack Cleveland, (formerly the Horseshoe Cleveland) is the other side of that coin. Its revenues dropped 16.1 percent from $242 million in 2013 to $203.57 last year.
In aggregate, the four casinos brought in $821.2 million in 2013, compared to $797.9 million last year.
The manager of a print shop in Columbus that is located near the casino, hasn’t seen much improvement as a result of the facility. “A lit bit of increase in business, a little bit of decrease in crime — just a little bit either way,” he said “Not as much as we hoped. The hope of course [was] the casino would bring in a lot of business but so far it doesn’t seem like it’s made anything over a small difference.”
A Toledo economist, Bill LaFayette, disputes that casinos generate much in the way of economic activity. “The point is if you are saying somebody in Toledo is going to the Toledo casino, you are not generating economic impact because that person from Toledo would have probably spent that money in the community anyway so you are simply relocating the money in the same community,” he told the Blade. “What you have to do is figure out what percentage of dollars generated in the casino is coming from outside.”
He said, “There have been some efforts at businesses opening but not nearly to the extent people were hoping. There was a mall called Westland just west of where the casino is in Columbus that actually went dark.”
The $400 million Hollywood Columbus was built in the city’s West Side that was in such decline that the Associated Press called it “America’s Loneliest Neighborhood” in 2009. The owner of a steak house near the casino gets some diners courtesy of the casino, but not a lot.
“There hasn’t been any real new — well I shouldn’t say nothing because even behind me there is the Big Lots … and Value City opened,” he told the Blade. “There is some new stuff but nothing huge. With any retail, they are not going to build just because the casino is here. The area has to support it.”
Hollywood Casino Toledo General Manager Rafael Verde told the Blade a different story: “One way is the tax contribution we pay to the state and local community. Another way is how was chose local vendors … and another way of economic activity would be the charities we partner with.”
He argues that the casinos draw an infusion of capital from out-of-state, including those who would be visiting Detroit’s three casinos. Before the Hollywood Casino opened, that was the closest place for residents of the city to visit a casino.
“Twenty-five percent to 30 percent of the revenue we generate is out-of-towers — more than a 50-mile radius away,” he said.
