Post by chris on Mar 28, 2008 16:42:38 GMT -5
Other states profit from Ohio's gambling fever
Posted by Robert L. Smith March 28, 2008 02:09AM
Also: FRONT PAGE, Cleveland Plain Dealer, Friday, March 23, 08
Ninety-nine miles from Cleveland, off Interstate 90 in northern Pennsylvania, the region's newest gambling destination rises outside of Erie like a handsome big-box store in the ex-urban sprawl.
There's no flashing neon or searchlights announcing Presque Isle Downs & Casino. When you're the only game around, players will find the door.
The Vegas-style glitz awaits inside, in a football-field-sized room the color of night. Slot machines blink and flash and chime. Virtual dealers call for bets from giant video screens. Rock music rains down from overhead.
People arrive by the thousands, almost around the clock, to play more than 2,000 electronic gambling machines. More than half the players drive in from Northeast Ohio, where such games are illegal. Pennsylvania, which skims 55 percent of slot machine profits, says, "Welcome, Buckeyes."
It's a greeting heard often these days in the border states, a welcome with a sting. As the neighbors increasingly turn to gambling to lighten their tax burden, they also turn to Ohioans to pay their bills.
Will Ohio leaders give in to pressure?
With the trend building, experts expect Ohio leaders to feel more and more pressure to join the game.
Cleveland is not the only Ohio city treasured by an out-of-state casino. Indiana riverboat casinos draw heavily from Cincinnati. West Virginia's two border casinos attract more than 60 percent of their customers from Ohio communities. Casinos in Detroit, Michigan, and Windsor, Ontario, treat Toledo like part of the neighborhood.
"It's just a matter of geography," said Ted Arneault, the CEO of MTR Gaming Group, which opened Presque Isle last year. "The people of Ohio like to have the same kinds of entertainment as everybody else."
Maybe 60 percent to 65 percent of his players cross the Ohio border, he said.
A 2005 study for the Greater Cleveland Partnership, exploring casino potential in Ohio, concluded Ohioans spend nearly $1 billion a year at casinos in just three states -- Michigan, Indiana and West Virginia.
That was before Pennsylvania began opening racetrack casinos. If Kentucky adopts casino gambling, as expected, the ring will be complete. Wholesome Ohio will be circled by casino states and provinces. It's a unique status that maybe few foresaw.
Ohio is poised to become America's only non-gambling state surrounded by states where gambling is legal. Does that make us better and wiser, or a chump?
Can state overlook economic benefits?
Just as there is a cost to legalized gambling -- more problem gamblers and gambling addictions, for example -- there is a cost to not gambling, experts say.
Twenty states now use casino proceeds to cut property taxes, create jobs, pave highways and balance budgets. Ohio, staring at a $2 billion budget deficit and a weak economy, says no dice. Yet.
Maybe Keno, a bingo-like gambling game that Gov. Ted Strickland plans to introduce in bars this summer, marks another step down the road to casinos. Or maybe it's too late.
One of the allures of Las Vegas-style gambling is the prospect of money from out of state. If all the neighbors have casinos, why would they come to Ohio?
Prominent Ohio lawmakers, from the governor on down, vow to keep Ohio casino-free, anyway. But they also talk about tax increases with the same strident opposition.
Elsewhere, gambling opponents have found that, when something has to give, money trumps principle.
Kansas plans to issue casino licenses. A $400 million casino is coming to Pittsburgh. The developer is throwing in a hockey arena. How long, some wonder, can Ohio hold out?
"Ohio is increasingly surrounded by legal casinos and that always creates tension in the political arena," said Bill Eadington, who studies the evolution of gambling for the University of Nevada, Reno. "People will be asking, 'Why are we gambling all our money in West Virginia?' "
Or Pennsylvania. Valerie Turner of Cleveland fumes walking past the Ohio license plates in the parking lot of Presque Isle, which she visits about once a week.
"Ohio upsets me because they would rather we take our money elsewhere than utilize it in our own cities," she said. "And you know we're hurting."
The success of border casinos alone will not convince skeptical legislators to gamble, Eadington said. Two other pressures typically tip the scales: citizens who want to gamble, and a fiscal crunch.
Charity bingo and handsome, corporate-owned casinos have helped the gambling industry to shed much of its seedy image, Eadington said. Meanwhile, politicians cannot raise taxes like they used to.
"There is less of a stigma to using gambling to solve budget problems," he said.
Once a state starts to gamble, it usually does so with relish. Just look at the neighbors.
Fifteen years after Indiana legalized gambling, 11 riverboat casinos generate more than $800 million a year in tax revenues. Casino revenues, about 8 percent of total state tax revenues, help Indiana lawmakers to avoid tax increases and program cuts.
"The take exceeded our expectations, probably fourfold at least," said Larry Borst, a Republican who served as chairman of the Senate Finance Committee for more than 30 years.
His former colleagues could still balance the budget without gambling, Borst said, but they won't. Newer games on bigger boats are aimed at property tax relief.
"It's become so popular," Borst said. "Where the end is, I have no idea."
Pennsylvania expects its fledgling casino industry to eventually generate $3 billion in annual tax revenues. Plans call for 14 casinos, including one near New Castle, 12 miles from Youngstown.
Last year, Kentucky Gov. Steve Beshear won an election widely seen as a referendum on casino gambling. In February, he presented the Kentucky General Assembly a plan for up to 12 casinos, projecting $600 million in annual tax revenues.
Conservatism runs deep in Ohio
Should lawmakers in Lexington bite, Ohio would stand alone. Proudly, some say. The state constitution prohibits most forms of gambling and that's fine with Tom Smith, the director of public policy for the Ohio Council of Churches.
Smith urges people to see the despair behind the bright lights. He said studies show the gaming industry profits alarmingly from luckless souls, low-income people and problem gamblers.
"These are people feeling the pressure of an economy gone sour," Smith said. "We've got to find better answers for them."
He's not the only one to see Keno as another step down a slippery slope.
Ohio State Sen. Ron Amstutz, a Wooster Republican, plans to introduce a bill banning the Ohio Lottery Commission from offering the game.
"I don't think the government should be encouraging people to gamble," he said.
Ohio voters seem to agree. Three times in recent history, voters rejected plans to amend the state constitution and expand gambling. Most recently, voters in 2006 rejected a proposal to place slot machines at horse tracks and to open casinos in Cleveland and Cincinnati.
"Part of it is definitely cultural," said Mary Anne Sharkey, a Cleveland political consultant and the former communications director for Gov. Bob Taft. "Conservatism runs deep in Ohio. So does religious belief. Especially downstate."
But beliefs can change. Bill Seitz, a Cincinnati Republican, once opposed casino gambling, he said. Then he learned that Argosy, Indiana's largest riverboat casino, drew the bulk of its customers from two ZIP codes in his Senate district.
"We can no longer stand there like King Canute commanding the waves not to roll in," Seitz said. "We're surrounded. The other states have strategically located their casinos. Why lose all that money to them?"
Developers continue their pitch in Ohio
The latest gambling pitch comes from a pair of Cleveland area developers. Rick Lertzman and Brad Pressman propose building the Midwest's largest casino in Clinton County, southwest of Columbus. They say their $600 million resort would draw out-of-state tourists and share proceeds with every Ohio county.
As they collect signatures to place the proposal on the November ballot, they plan an advertising blitz that asks, "Can all our neighbors be wrong?"
Whether or not they succeed, experts say the pair have the right idea. Ohio, should it decide to gamble, would have to build something bigger and better than the neighbor's place to get them to come here.
"It's the quality of the entertainment that makes the difference," said Arneault, who also created the Mountaineer Race Track and Gaming Resort, across the Ohio River from East Liverpool, Ohio.
For now, the entertainment bar is not set awfully high.
On a cloudy Thursday, Presque Isle stirred with people like Richard and Shirley Green of Wadsworth -- Ohioans on the regional gambling circuit. She likes the video poker games. He plays "virtual blackjack."
There are no dealers at Presque Isle. Pennsylvania law limits the casino to electronic games. Live shows are infrequent. The horses don't start running until May.
Still, the Greens say they might spend $200 during a day here, on gambling and on dinner. They help to support a work force of 700, a $10 million payroll and three new hotels nearby.
"This is our entertainment," said Richard Green, who retired after 40 years in credit management with Sears. "The people in Ohio who don't like to gamble, why would they vote against it? I'm not hurting them. It's stupid."
The couple came with friends R.G. and Mary Lou Stein, of Akron, who remarked upon the many people they meet at Presque Isle from Cleveland, Akron and Canton.
"But it's that way everywhere we go," she said. "Niagara Falls, Indiana, Detroit. My gosh. It's all Ohio people."
Plain Dealer researcher JoEllen Corrigan contributed to this story.
Posted by Robert L. Smith March 28, 2008 02:09AM
Also: FRONT PAGE, Cleveland Plain Dealer, Friday, March 23, 08
Ninety-nine miles from Cleveland, off Interstate 90 in northern Pennsylvania, the region's newest gambling destination rises outside of Erie like a handsome big-box store in the ex-urban sprawl.
There's no flashing neon or searchlights announcing Presque Isle Downs & Casino. When you're the only game around, players will find the door.
The Vegas-style glitz awaits inside, in a football-field-sized room the color of night. Slot machines blink and flash and chime. Virtual dealers call for bets from giant video screens. Rock music rains down from overhead.
People arrive by the thousands, almost around the clock, to play more than 2,000 electronic gambling machines. More than half the players drive in from Northeast Ohio, where such games are illegal. Pennsylvania, which skims 55 percent of slot machine profits, says, "Welcome, Buckeyes."
It's a greeting heard often these days in the border states, a welcome with a sting. As the neighbors increasingly turn to gambling to lighten their tax burden, they also turn to Ohioans to pay their bills.
Will Ohio leaders give in to pressure?
With the trend building, experts expect Ohio leaders to feel more and more pressure to join the game.
Cleveland is not the only Ohio city treasured by an out-of-state casino. Indiana riverboat casinos draw heavily from Cincinnati. West Virginia's two border casinos attract more than 60 percent of their customers from Ohio communities. Casinos in Detroit, Michigan, and Windsor, Ontario, treat Toledo like part of the neighborhood.
"It's just a matter of geography," said Ted Arneault, the CEO of MTR Gaming Group, which opened Presque Isle last year. "The people of Ohio like to have the same kinds of entertainment as everybody else."
Maybe 60 percent to 65 percent of his players cross the Ohio border, he said.
A 2005 study for the Greater Cleveland Partnership, exploring casino potential in Ohio, concluded Ohioans spend nearly $1 billion a year at casinos in just three states -- Michigan, Indiana and West Virginia.
That was before Pennsylvania began opening racetrack casinos. If Kentucky adopts casino gambling, as expected, the ring will be complete. Wholesome Ohio will be circled by casino states and provinces. It's a unique status that maybe few foresaw.
Ohio is poised to become America's only non-gambling state surrounded by states where gambling is legal. Does that make us better and wiser, or a chump?
Can state overlook economic benefits?
Just as there is a cost to legalized gambling -- more problem gamblers and gambling addictions, for example -- there is a cost to not gambling, experts say.
Twenty states now use casino proceeds to cut property taxes, create jobs, pave highways and balance budgets. Ohio, staring at a $2 billion budget deficit and a weak economy, says no dice. Yet.
Maybe Keno, a bingo-like gambling game that Gov. Ted Strickland plans to introduce in bars this summer, marks another step down the road to casinos. Or maybe it's too late.
One of the allures of Las Vegas-style gambling is the prospect of money from out of state. If all the neighbors have casinos, why would they come to Ohio?
Prominent Ohio lawmakers, from the governor on down, vow to keep Ohio casino-free, anyway. But they also talk about tax increases with the same strident opposition.
Elsewhere, gambling opponents have found that, when something has to give, money trumps principle.
Kansas plans to issue casino licenses. A $400 million casino is coming to Pittsburgh. The developer is throwing in a hockey arena. How long, some wonder, can Ohio hold out?
"Ohio is increasingly surrounded by legal casinos and that always creates tension in the political arena," said Bill Eadington, who studies the evolution of gambling for the University of Nevada, Reno. "People will be asking, 'Why are we gambling all our money in West Virginia?' "
Or Pennsylvania. Valerie Turner of Cleveland fumes walking past the Ohio license plates in the parking lot of Presque Isle, which she visits about once a week.
"Ohio upsets me because they would rather we take our money elsewhere than utilize it in our own cities," she said. "And you know we're hurting."
The success of border casinos alone will not convince skeptical legislators to gamble, Eadington said. Two other pressures typically tip the scales: citizens who want to gamble, and a fiscal crunch.
Charity bingo and handsome, corporate-owned casinos have helped the gambling industry to shed much of its seedy image, Eadington said. Meanwhile, politicians cannot raise taxes like they used to.
"There is less of a stigma to using gambling to solve budget problems," he said.
Once a state starts to gamble, it usually does so with relish. Just look at the neighbors.
Fifteen years after Indiana legalized gambling, 11 riverboat casinos generate more than $800 million a year in tax revenues. Casino revenues, about 8 percent of total state tax revenues, help Indiana lawmakers to avoid tax increases and program cuts.
"The take exceeded our expectations, probably fourfold at least," said Larry Borst, a Republican who served as chairman of the Senate Finance Committee for more than 30 years.
His former colleagues could still balance the budget without gambling, Borst said, but they won't. Newer games on bigger boats are aimed at property tax relief.
"It's become so popular," Borst said. "Where the end is, I have no idea."
Pennsylvania expects its fledgling casino industry to eventually generate $3 billion in annual tax revenues. Plans call for 14 casinos, including one near New Castle, 12 miles from Youngstown.
Last year, Kentucky Gov. Steve Beshear won an election widely seen as a referendum on casino gambling. In February, he presented the Kentucky General Assembly a plan for up to 12 casinos, projecting $600 million in annual tax revenues.
Conservatism runs deep in Ohio
Should lawmakers in Lexington bite, Ohio would stand alone. Proudly, some say. The state constitution prohibits most forms of gambling and that's fine with Tom Smith, the director of public policy for the Ohio Council of Churches.
Smith urges people to see the despair behind the bright lights. He said studies show the gaming industry profits alarmingly from luckless souls, low-income people and problem gamblers.
"These are people feeling the pressure of an economy gone sour," Smith said. "We've got to find better answers for them."
He's not the only one to see Keno as another step down a slippery slope.
Ohio State Sen. Ron Amstutz, a Wooster Republican, plans to introduce a bill banning the Ohio Lottery Commission from offering the game.
"I don't think the government should be encouraging people to gamble," he said.
Ohio voters seem to agree. Three times in recent history, voters rejected plans to amend the state constitution and expand gambling. Most recently, voters in 2006 rejected a proposal to place slot machines at horse tracks and to open casinos in Cleveland and Cincinnati.
"Part of it is definitely cultural," said Mary Anne Sharkey, a Cleveland political consultant and the former communications director for Gov. Bob Taft. "Conservatism runs deep in Ohio. So does religious belief. Especially downstate."
But beliefs can change. Bill Seitz, a Cincinnati Republican, once opposed casino gambling, he said. Then he learned that Argosy, Indiana's largest riverboat casino, drew the bulk of its customers from two ZIP codes in his Senate district.
"We can no longer stand there like King Canute commanding the waves not to roll in," Seitz said. "We're surrounded. The other states have strategically located their casinos. Why lose all that money to them?"
Developers continue their pitch in Ohio
The latest gambling pitch comes from a pair of Cleveland area developers. Rick Lertzman and Brad Pressman propose building the Midwest's largest casino in Clinton County, southwest of Columbus. They say their $600 million resort would draw out-of-state tourists and share proceeds with every Ohio county.
As they collect signatures to place the proposal on the November ballot, they plan an advertising blitz that asks, "Can all our neighbors be wrong?"
Whether or not they succeed, experts say the pair have the right idea. Ohio, should it decide to gamble, would have to build something bigger and better than the neighbor's place to get them to come here.
"It's the quality of the entertainment that makes the difference," said Arneault, who also created the Mountaineer Race Track and Gaming Resort, across the Ohio River from East Liverpool, Ohio.
For now, the entertainment bar is not set awfully high.
On a cloudy Thursday, Presque Isle stirred with people like Richard and Shirley Green of Wadsworth -- Ohioans on the regional gambling circuit. She likes the video poker games. He plays "virtual blackjack."
There are no dealers at Presque Isle. Pennsylvania law limits the casino to electronic games. Live shows are infrequent. The horses don't start running until May.
Still, the Greens say they might spend $200 during a day here, on gambling and on dinner. They help to support a work force of 700, a $10 million payroll and three new hotels nearby.
"This is our entertainment," said Richard Green, who retired after 40 years in credit management with Sears. "The people in Ohio who don't like to gamble, why would they vote against it? I'm not hurting them. It's stupid."
The couple came with friends R.G. and Mary Lou Stein, of Akron, who remarked upon the many people they meet at Presque Isle from Cleveland, Akron and Canton.
"But it's that way everywhere we go," she said. "Niagara Falls, Indiana, Detroit. My gosh. It's all Ohio people."
Plain Dealer researcher JoEllen Corrigan contributed to this story.
