Blue Mass Group

Reality-based commentary on politics.

The closing of Wonderland, and the Globe’s front page

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So as we know, the Wonderland dog racing track closed down last week, and either 85 or 150 jobs were lost as a result.  I spoke to the head of MA’s Rapid Response unit, Ken Messina, on Friday, and he told me that his agency has been working directly with the displaced workers to help them find new jobs.  Here’s hoping they are successful.

But here’s the thing.  Did an event that led to the loss of 85-150 private-sector jobs really merit front-page articles in both daily newspapers?  Let’s look at a few news reports of similar sized, or larger, private-sector job losses over 2009-2010, including Wonderland, and see whether they made the Globe’s front page (archived versions of the Herald front page are not available, as far as I can tell).  These are arranged in decreasing order of jobs lost, and these are the ones I could find on a quick Google search of the Globe’s archives.  (If you find more reports, drop them in the comments, and I’ll update the table.)

Company Jobs lost in MA Globe front page?
EMC 600 No
Pfizer 300 No*
Sovereign Bank 265 No*
Brigham’s 200 Yes
Ames Envelope 150 No
Wonderland Park 85-150 Yes
Hyatt 100 Yes
Beverly Hospital 75-100 No*
Boston Globe 50 No

*Story was flagged in the “In the news” column which runs down the left side of the front page.

Based just on the numbers of jobs, it’s hard to see why Wonderland merited the front page.  The actual fact of the business closing and 85-150 people losing their jobs seems, based on past practice at the Globe, to merit a story in the business pages, with at most maybe a little blurb in the front page’s “In the news” column.  The Ames Envelope story is particularly interesting: 150 manufacturing jobs lost, and it appears that the story didn’t even make the actual Globe, since the report is on one of the Globe’s local “your town” pages.

Of the two other stories deemed front-page-worthy, Brigham’s made the front page because pretty much everyone who grew up around here remembers going to Brigham’s when they were kids.  The Hyatt made the front page because Hyatt is an enormously wealthy multinational corporation that thought that saving a relatively very small amount of money (about $7 an hour plus modest benefits) was worth eliminating 100 jobs – and it made the outsourced workers train their replacements.  That’s a good story (“giant evil corporation beats up on poor women”), so one can understand the editorial decision to front-page it.

Of course, what drove the Wonderland story to the front page wasn’t the number of lost jobs, nor was it factors like those that put Brigham’s or the Hyatt there.  It was the reaction on Beacon Hill, which seems wildly out of proportion to the actual job losses.  Did we see all the big players pointing fingers to assign blame when, for instance, Pfizer cut 300 Massachusetts jobs?  Did we see the House Speaker demanding an immediate $2 million in state aid for the 150 workers at Ames Envelope who lost their jobs?  Did we see state reps spluttering with anger when Sovereign Bank let 265 MA workers go?  Nope.  (Interestingly, though, we did see the Governor wade into the Hyatt dispute.  His action was criticized by Charlie Baker, but did succeed in getting Hyatt to significantly improve their offer.)

The near-hysteria that erupted on Beacon Hill, and from Beacon Hill wannabes (both Baker and Cahill blamed Governor Patrick – surprise!), upon Wonderland’s demise tells you quite a lot about the mindset of Beacon Hill and of those who’d like to work there – none of it good.  It’s difficult to escape the conclusion that it’s not about the jobs.  It’s about the well-connected guys who own the tracks.  And that’s profoundly depressing.

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  1. Thousands of jobs cut by Fidelity, BOA, and Merrill Lynch…nary a whisper.

    <

    p>Verizon sends call centers to India.  The silence is deafening.  

  2. be eliminated as a result of a ballot question. Not necessarily wrong, but at least pretty rare.  If citizens themselves voted in a controversial new environmental regulation or something that appeared to result in 100 layoffs, it might get front-paged.
    Also, how many cleaning people did the Hyatt lay off? That got some front page attention, right?

    • the ballot question passed almost two years ago.  That’s old, old news.  Obviously it was big news when it happened, but everyone knew at the time that it would inevitably lead to job losses.

      <

      p>The Hyatt, though, is an interesting example: about 100 jobs were at issue there.  I’ll add it to the table.  Also, the Brigham’s closure seems comparable, which I’ll also add.

      • dog racing was already doomed as a business. Neither track could have survived as a business for more than a few more years without a new source of revenue.

        <

        p>Several other tracks around the country have shut down in the last several years purely for financial reasons.

        • Around the country, SLOTS have been used as a pretext to ‘save racing.’

          <

          p>In time, the tracks use the cost of racing to eliminate them.

          <

          p>Isn’t it curious that they get to keep the SLOTS?

          <

          p>Carey got it right here:
          The Mainstream Media and Beacon Hill Have a Crush on Wonderland

          <

          p>Greyhound Racing
          contains —

          Posted on October 2nd, 2009 by NoMoreRacing
          Good news! Good news! Good news!
          Since 2004, 17 tracks have closed for live racing from the West Coast to the East, North and South. Two more are slated to close within three months.
          -Apache Greyhound Park (AZ),
          -Multnomah Greyhound Park (OR),
          -Plainfield Greyhound Park (CT),
          -Geneva Lakes (WI),
          -Shoreline Star (CT),
          -Cloverleaf (CO),
          -Jacksonville Kennel Club (FL),
          -Tampa Greyhound Park (FL),
          -Wichita Greyhound Park (KS),
          -Corpus Christi (TX),
          -The Woodlands (KS),
          -Hinsdale (NH),
          -Mile High (C0),
          -Belmont (NH),
          -Seabrook (NH),
          -Wonderland (MA),
          -Valley Park (TX)
          -Phoenix (AZ) and Raynham Park (MA) will close in December 2009

          Once Raynham shuts down, with no other closures until then, there will be 24 operational tracks in nine states.

          24 is too many. Find out more about how you can take action.

          This is all good news.

          Old people who are drawn to the cruel sport of greyhound racing are diminishing in numbers and the generation that grew up watching Animal Planet are hip to the cruelty of greyhound racing.

  3. And it begs the question, should we give a no-bid contract for a racino to EMC?  Why, in many elected officials’ view, are the owners of Wonderland entitled to such a windfall?  And what kinds of jobs will there be at those racinos?  Does anyone believe that those people who were laid off will get the meager number of jobs at a racino?

    <

    p>What we really need, desperately, is a real Federal stimulus program for the unemployed, creating real jobs — not just for the Wonderland workers, but for all the workers at EMC and those other businesses who have lost their jobs.  Maybe we could fund it, to Scott Brown’s satisfaction, by increasing the taxes on the income of the lobbyists for the race tracks who are the only winners in this mess.  Oh, sorry, forgot — Scott Brown is in bed with those lobbyists.  My bad.

  5. Even before the ballot question, business at Wonderland was going down. It may have shut down on its own in a few years anyway.

    <

    p>Recessions are a great time to get rid of the corrupt cronies and their sweetheart deals, because there’s no money to waste on them.

    <

    p>I would much rather have a ROARING national economy and 150 sweetheart deals like Wonderland/DeLeo, but that’s not what’s going on now.

    <

    p>If there is going to be change in gambling law, do it PATRICK’S WAY.

    <

    p>Patrick is looking at doing it for new jobs in:

    <

    p>Construction for the buildings

    <

    p>Table Games

    <

    p>Stores

    <

    p>Restaurants

    <

    p>Hotels

    <

    p>Deval Patrick is thinking of the whole state, not just a few cronies.

    <

    p>The vast majority of unemployed people in Massachusetts are “on the outs” also. What I mean is that they have no insider connections and are on their own.

    <

    p>For this majority, the Patrick way is much better than the DeLeo way.

    <

    p>  

    • The Governor made a grievous error in initially proposing expanded gambling after reading BENEFITS reports  filled with glaring errors that ignored the COSTS and IMPACTS.

      <

      p>The Governor, as a consequence of his position as Governor, is isolated, with input from the likes of those such as Doug Rubin.

      <

      p>What you get for $600 MILLION is a SLOT BARN, not what you pretend (see previous posts).

      <

      p>To expand gambling caters to vested interests at the expense of taxpayers.

      <

      p>A federal study determined that every $1 in gambling tax revenue costs taxpayers $3.

      <

      p>Again, the words of former Attorney General Scott Harshbarger —

      <

      p>

      The three states with the highest unemployment rates in the nation are Michigan, Nevada, and Rhode Island, all home to casinos or racinos. With decreased earnings, fewer gamblers, and limited casino borrowing, layoffs are hitting their casinos.

      The number of jobs the proposed legislation would create has been wildly exaggerated. We are told that two casinos and four racinos will net about 16,000 construction and permanent jobs. But in Indiana it takes 10 riverboats, one casino and two racinos to generate 16,000 current jobs and Louisiana requires 18 casinos to employ 17,268, according to the American Gaming Association.

      The states that most closely mirror the current legislation suggest that the real results will be but a fraction of the job estimates we have been hearing. Michigan’s three casinos net 8,568 permanent jobs and New Mexico’s five racinos employ less than 2,000 people.

      After jobs, the argument for casinos is that they provide a new state revenue stream. But the numbers don’t add up.

      Commonwealth Magazine reported that in order to reach the revenue estimates when the bill was unveiled – of between $1.4 billion and $1.9 billion – somewhere between $5.6 billion and $7.2 billion must be bet and lost at the two proposed casinos every year.

      In Las Vegas, it takes 266 casinos to bring in $11.6 billion in gross revenue, which translates into $924 million in tax revenue. Even the $300 million to $600 million now estimated here is a stretch based on that data.

      The list of questions based on the experience of other states about the costs – fiscal, economic, social, and human – only grows from there.

      That is why we and others have argued for a full cost-benefit analysis before the House votes. That seems like a common sense thing to do on an issue this important and the governor agrees.

      • First, I do not think Deval Patrick is the “Messiah”.

        <

        p>But, overall, I see him as a good public servant.

        <

        p>Is gambling AN issue? Yes, absolutely.

        <

        p>If anyone wants to know something that I consider a non-issue, I will be happy to give an example.

        <

        p>But, it is not THE issue.

        <

        p>The gambling status quo in Massachusetts is tolerable and acceptable. But, it is not this priceless gem that is the end-all and be-all.

        <

        p>And, truthfully, Patrick and the 49 other state governors are getting a lot of blame that should be placed with the UNITED STATES SENATE A/K/A THE MILLIONAIRES CLUB.

        <

        p>They have some real winners there, like Jim “Tough Shit” Bunning (R-KY), Ben “Mush Brain Marble Mouth” Nelson (D-NE), and Joe “Holy Joementum” Lieberman (Connecticut for Lieberman-CT).

        <

        p>If not for the US Senate, as a whole, there would have been a MUCH LARGER federal spending bill.

        <

        p>What should be happening, coast to coast and border to border, is ground breakings at HUGE INDUSTRIAL PARKS, which will employ masses of people at least a living wage?

        <

        p>And if their employer will be Uncle Sam? So much the better.

        <

        p>And if the gasbags would say that those who made it happen are “COMMUNISTS, SOCIALISTS, AND GOAT-MOLESTING DEVIL WORSHIPERS”, who cares? Who cares what these old fools have to say? And if a few of them have heart attacks and die from the stress of seeing radical change, that’s a price that’s worth paying.

        <

        p>As for Scott Harshbarger, he has really hurt some innocent people in the past with witch hunts. That is before 2000, and has nothing to do with gambling.

        • but your comments had little to do with your continued repetition of a fairy tale.

          <

          p>For $600 million, you get a SLOT BARN – nothing more.

          <

          p>When this odyssey began in Middleboro + 3 years ago, I joined those who had opposed expanded gambling for many years. That includes Scott Harshbarger. Instead of considering or addressing the facts in the quote posted, you resorted to a personal attack and discredit yourself in doing so simply because of a pre-conceived notion or because you don’t want to consider the facts.

          <

          p>Maybe it was NIMBY on my part when it began, but the more I learned about the deleterious effects of SLOTS on communities and states, the more I opposed the prospects of the Commonwealth following simply because ‘everyone else is doing it.’

          <

          p>It makes no difference whether it’s in Raynham, Plainridge or Fall River, New Bedford.

          <

          p>The increased crime the Wealthy Gambling Vultures would pretend doesn’t exist effects me, as a resident, as a taxpayer. It jeopardizes my friends who might be at risk of Gambling Addiction. It exploits those who can least afford it.

          <

          p>SLOTS don’t create jobs, economic development or increase tourism.

          <

          p>Gambling Addiction has the lowest rate of self-referral and the highest rate of suicide, the ultimate price to enrich the already wealthy.

          <

          p>In —
          The Mask Slips

          <

          p>it includes Florence, a community that SOLD itself for 200 jobs —

          <

          p>

          Shortly after Three Rivers opened, local media reported the “first suicide at the Florence casino.”

          On the morning of Feb. 29, 2008, Steven L. Martin, 58, of Westlake, died of self-inflicted gunshot wounds in the parking lot in front of Three Rivers Casino along Highway 126 in Florence.

          Although casino marketing quickly moved to hush this suicide and other crimes of pain associated with those who’ve also lost their shirt at Three Rivers, “a chill moved through Florence as if it was saying we screwed-up and sold our beloved Florence for a parking lot full of grief and service oriented gambling jobs,” said Mavis Walters of Florence.

          “They no longer keep track of the suicides associated with gambling losses, but look at this economy and no jobs and yet the casino here is full with those who want to hit the big one. Nobody really hits the big one, and if they do it’s one in hundreds of thousands. It’s all very sad to see a tourist community held hostage to gambling. But that’s the case with more than 200 jobs at Three Rivers.

          <

          p>Do you even remember this?
          Primadonna Casino and Sherrice Iverson

          <

          p>Each SLOT MACHINE permanently removes ONE JOB  from the local economy by sucking discretionary income out.

          <

          p>The Governor got it wrong because he’s isolated and surrounded by mindless lackeys unwilling to tell the Emperor he has no clothes.

          <

          p>

          good public servant[s]

          make mistakes and the Governor needs to recognize he made a big one here.

          <

          p>You might consider some of what’s posted here —
          United to Stop Slots in Massachusetts

          Middleboro Remembers
          Casinos: Limited Tourism Benefit

          <

          p>Responsible public policy does not create a foundation of exploitation.

  6. The others all involve active businesses being sold, or choosing to move jobs away to other places than Massachusetts.

    <

    p>The fact that the track and Brighams were closed as businesses might have affected newsworthiness – after all, how many other businesses leave Massachusetts to continue elsewhere?

  7. as a reason to keep dog racing and as a reason to allow slots. Since an issue was made of it, the paper reported the aftermath. Worth a front-page story? Maybe not.

  8. The difference seems to be well-paid lobbyists and legislators who have consumed too much Casino KoolAid.

    <

    p>One might suggest that had legislators expended as much energy on working to preserve small businesses that don’t merit the same attention, we’d be in a better place.  

  9. Hey, what’s the harm in a little misleading, special interest journalism these days?

    <

    p>O’Neill Associates sponsor of the for-profit State House News Service  (as opposed to the commonly assumed public non-profit NPR-esque watchdogs of Beacon Hill) is the lobbying firm for Mohegan Sun.

    <

    p>How many businesses besides Mohegan Sun, O’Neill’s client, has SHNS highlighted when they opened an obscure storefront in western Massachusetts?  

  10. “Is it news that some fellow out in South Succotash someplace has just been laid off, that he should be interviewed nationwide?”
      I think it’s a big deal when people lose their jobs, especially in a recession.
      The Globe is right to cover it even if the story is inconvenient for one side or another in the casino/racino debate.
      It is mean-spirited beyond belief that would complain that the people getting laid off are somehow getting special treatment.
      Do you intend to continue to channeling Ronald Reagan on this blog, or are you planning to move on to Richard Nixon and Joe McCarthy?  

    • and read my post again.  The point I was making is that, as a matter of usual practice, stories about people losing their jobs in a recession have not been front page news, at least according to the Globe.  There are a couple of times when that pattern has been broken, and I think it’s interesting to think about why that is.  It is clearly not the number of jobs; other factors must be at work.  It tells us something about both our political and our media culture to understand what’s going on here.

      <

      p>But if you’d rather call me names, hey, that’s great too.

  11. about a dozen people I suspect. Yet, you will agree that should be front page news if it ever closes down.

    <

    p>David, you carpet bagger you. Please don’t tell us real locals that it isn’t front page news when our dog track closes after so many years of being an intregal part of the working class community.When you and Charlie and Bob were growing up far far from here there was a world going on here that you don’t know. You think you know, but you don’t.

    <

    p>The closing of Wonderland Dog Track is front page news you schmuck! The jobs were the side story as they are every time an institution shuts its doors.

    <

    p>

    • EB3, do you think it would have bee appropriate for the MSM to also do a side story on all the dogs who raced (and died) at Wonderland?

      <

      p>I’m just curious as to whether you think that is a legitimate part of the story.  They are a part of the Wonderland history, too.  In fact, Wonderland would never have existed without them.

      • jibe with the evidence of the treatment of greyhounds at Mass tracks for the past 20 years.

        • Carey & co. did a very good job of using information supplied by the tracks themselves.  If you want to try to dispute it, knock yourself out, but I doubt you’ll be able to.  If the tracks could have, they would have.

        • Are state injury reports, received from the Massachusetts State Racing Commission, showing over 800 greyhound injuries (80% of these were broken legs) between 2002 and 2008 propaganda?

          <

          p>Or are you referring to the photographs that were taken by Wonderland in 2006, that document the lives of confinement dogs experienced?  Or the further documentation of this confinement found in public statements made by greyhound trainers working in Massachusetts?

          <

          p>Or are you referring to the video footage documenting confinement and greyhound injuries that was taken by the Massachusetts racetracks themselves in 2006 and 2007?

          <

          p>Or perhaps you would like to offer up the “evidence” you are referring to?

      • avoids it and attacks me for being anonymous. Like he just did.  Pretty anti-intellectual David. Besides David, nobody reads my stuff as much as you. A person would have to be a complete moron to not deduce I am a local yocal.

        <

        p>People like me are tired of being talked down to by intellectual and wealthy elitist who are compelled to tell us everything that is wrong with our simple way of life.

        • it’s a little hard to take your claims to authenticity seriously when we have no idea who you are or where you’ve been.  And I assume you know that I was born and grew up in and around Boston, and have lived here most of my life.  

          <

          p>People like me are tired of people like you pretending they represent the “real” Boston.  Especially when we don’t even know who “people like you” are.

    • Wonderland is a landmark, however one feels about it.

      <

      p>I also like AmberPaw’s point above, but corporate downsizings are too routine to be front-page news.

      <

      p>

    • A story that marks the passing of a local institution might have a headline such as:

      <

      p>The end of an era — Wonderland to shut down

      <

      p>For example, an era ended when Whalom Park closed in 2000. The wooden roller coaster (“The Black Hole”) merited this piece when it was demolished in 2006. The headline? “Coasting to a stop at Whalom Park.”

      <

      p>Take another look at the headline on Friday’s Globe piece announcing the shutdown of Wonderland Park:
      Wonderland Park shuts down, rekindling debate over slots

      <

      p>The subhead?

      <

      p>Decision ends 75 years of operation; 85 laid off.

      <

      p>That’s hardly a “side story”. Here’s the lead (emphasis mine):

      Wonderland Park, the former greyhound racing facility in Revere, abruptly closed yesterday and laid off 85 employees, ending 75 years of operations and triggering a new round of recriminations over the failure of expanded gambling legislation on Beacon Hill.

      <

      p>I don’t think anybody would have objected to a front-page story emphasizing the many traditions that ended with the closure of Wonderland Park. That, however, is not the story that the Globe put on its front page.

      <

      p>I far prefer your version; too bad you don’t edit the front page of the Globe (yet).

      • That’s like last week Bob. BTW Bob, how old are you? For crissakes have you ever had a job? How do you pay for all that tuition? Just wondering because in a comment above I wrote

        People like me are tired of being talked down to by intellectual and wealthy elitist who are compelled to tell us everything that is wrong with our simple way of life.

        <

        p>What have you ever done Bob to earn your keep. You watch people swim and tell us what lousy swimmers they are yet appears you have never jumped in the pool yourself. So how the hell would you know?

        <

        p>Yes I know you can turn this around and say the same about me. Yet I believe my BMG writings allude to the fact that I have jumped into the pool many times. Just because I’m anonymous doesn’t mean I don’t have real life working class experiences. Without a trust fund. Doesn’t make me bettet than you, just more expereinced.

        • Sadly, the phrase “intellectual and wealthy elitist” too often means “somebody who disagrees with me.” Spiro Agnew was much better at tossing this canard then you are, Ernie. Will you next accuse me of being an outside agitator?

          <

          p>The only “talking down” I see in this thread is coming from you, as nearly as I can tell because you blew your comment (“The jobs were the side story”) and don’t like being called on it.

          <

          p>Wonderland should have closed a decade ago. There is a very long list of better things for the government to worry about than keeping Wonderland on life-support and there is an even longer list of reasons why the unholy alliance between the legislature and the gambling industry is nauseating — the Globe’s front-page excesses notwithstanding.

          <

          p>The very best thing that government could do for working stiffs in this state (like you and me) is take a tiny fraction of the trillions of dollars concentrated in the estates of a handful (like about 100) of our state’s wealthiest individuals and return it to the pockets of working stiffs upon the death of those wealthy individuals.

          <

          p>Poor Buffy III would have to make do with an inheritance of only $9,850,000,000 instead $10,000,000,000 — I hope she won’t starve.

    • …so many years of being an intregal part of the working class community

      What? I was born in Boston. All my working life has been here, until recently all blue-collar jobs. Never went to Wonderland, because I never wanted to. The place was not an integral part of any of the working-class communities I was ever a member of – the people I knew had better things to do. What do you do for a living, EB, that you get to define what’s integral to those communities?

  12. To be honest I’m only vaguely aware of Wonderland’s existence.  Even then I know the name primarily as the stop at the end of the Blue Line.  If you were to ask me to name a track in MA I’d say first Suffolk Downs and second – well, I probably wouldn’t have been able to come up with a second.

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