So, did anyone know the casino proposal includes giving one out of every ten dollars to, as my little sister would have said years ago, “the horseys,” all thanks to special interests? This is the big, new development in the bill, and is apparently what is making the speaker feel as though he can go along without his precious no-bid contract on the tracks that he long wanted. Now that the dog tracks are gone, the forces that be can get some other little extra goodie for their race track special interest friends. Ra, ra corporate welfare!
Does that seem reasonable to anyone, when we have thousands of teachers being laid off, or when we know the casinos will have a nasty effect on local businesses? If it doesn’t, you better tell your state legislators before they go and do something stupid, and something that they’ll regret for years to come.
For anyone who still thinks this bill is a good idea, I’d like to point you to this post I wrote on Ernie’s diary. The numbers have never added up, not in the methodology of the (hack-produced) studies that predict how much we “lose” by not having casinos, and not in the ever-important scales of the cost-benefits. When you factor in the increased costs of regulation and the much ignored, but very real “social ills,” and the hits we’d take to real estate taxes in local communities hit by these things, in losses to small businesses that can’t keep up with these behemoth state-sponsored monopolies, which means less income tax and sales tax revenue, and the whammy to the state lottery (estimated to be 10% of a billion that goes directly to cities and towns) and I don’t see how this possibly adds up.
At best, comparing revenue gained to revenue lost, and permanent jobs created at the casinos versus permanent jobs lost in the regions surrounding the casino, they’d be even — but it’s going to be YOUR friends and YOUR neighbors who’s business goes under, it’s going to be YOUR favorite local pub and YOUR local downtown area that goes kaboom. It’s going to be our families that deal with the money sources of the casinos — problem gamblers from the regions surrounding casinos that make them the bulk of their money — and those are going to be a drain on us all not only monetarily, but in terms of quality of life.
It ain’t over till it’s over, and I hope people will be on their phones telling their legislators they better think twice in the coming days. Otherwise, we’re about to have the wool thrown over us. At the very, very least, we must demand and expect that there are no special interest giveaways in any of these bills.
Though be forewarned: Without the special interest giveaways, the bill will probably die. Because we can’t be having legislative leadership that isn’t about helping your friends, instead of the rank and file people of this state, can we? There’s a reason why this bill was created behind closed doors. Call your legislators.
I agree, casinos are bad for the state. But since we have them…
You really should spend an afternoon at Suffolk Ryan.
And if we keep protesting, we may not. Even if the Dems DO have the fix in.