Dear
Supporters,
In the state’s biggest political stunner since
Scott Brown won a US Senate seat, Attorney General Martha Coakley announced
today she did not approve the proposed ballot question that would repeal the
law allowing state government to partner with gambling interests for the purpose
of promoting casino gambling to its citizens.
Despite this head-scratching news, nothing
changes regarding the signature drive. We will file an injunction that will
allow the signature drive to proceed as normal. After we collect the required 68,911 certified
signatures of registered voters across the state throughout the fall, the
Supreme Judicial Court will hear the case in the spring of 2014.
There are very powerful interests committed to
doing everything they can to suppress the power of concerned citizens to take
action on this issue. Here’s a brief summary of what has happened to date:
A movement to place a ballot question before
voters prohibiting the state’s promotion of casinos has been growing since 2010.
Back then, the Legislature passed a casino bill at the end of the session and
Governor Patrick, the bill’s chief advocate, vetoed it because it included slot
parlors (and he was in a re-election campaign.) Citizens had organized
themselves and undertaken the necessary preparations to launch a signature drive
that would have put a repeal question on the next statewide ballot. The bill was
vetoed so no citizen effort was required.
Casino proponents resumed their drive in the
2011 legislative session, passing a bill in November of that year, one Governor
Patrick eagerly signed. Anticipating citizen efforts to once again attempt to
place a casino repeal question before the state’s voters, legislative leaders
purposely inserted budget language which under the state constitution made it
legally impossible to repeal at that time. A coalition of individuals and
citizen groups did file a repeal petition but it was rejected by Attorney
General Coakley on the grounds it included the budget language.
Citizens were advised
to pursue the next available opportunity: the initiative petition process
starting in 2013. The coalition enlisted a top Boston attorney with experience
writing initiative petitions and the attorney was in regular communication with
the AG's division head about the petition for several weeks prior to its filing.
We've seen all of the communication between our legal counsel and the Attorney
General’s office during that span…the AG's ruling literally comes out of the
blue.
Here’s what the
Attorney General declared was the sudden hang up: 11 casino operators have paid
$400,000 apiece to apply for a casino license.
Never mind that a maximum of four
applicants could be selected, leaving seven applicants who would have lost their
$400,000 anyway.
When you think about
the Attorney General’s concern in the context of what has transpired in
Massachusetts in recent times, it seems almost silly that they're fixated on
reimbursing casinos for their lost investment of $400,000. Casino interests have
spent almost $25 million lobbying the legislature over the last fifteen years;
they've spent millions of dollars on the most sophisticated public affairs
campaigns the state have ever seen, not including the millions of dollars of
strategic donations to improve their political standing among influential
opinion leaders and non-profits; and then, they spent even more millions of
dollars to ram their proposals through local communities in the most lopsided
campaigns in state history (MGM spent at least $12 million on their Springfield
campaign alone.) But the Attorney General said forget all of this: casinos have
purchased the privilege to their regional monopoly and it outweighs the
constitutional right of citizens to petition unjust laws of their own
government.
We need your help
right now for us to win this battle of Big Citizenship vs. Big Casinos:
- Collect signatures of voters in your city and town. It’s not hard to collect signatures and we will have an excellent one-pager to train people on how to do it. It’ll be available soon. Please help us by signing up on our website to collect signatures.
- Donate as much as you can afford to the casino repeal campaign today. (Thank you to those who have already donated) We need to raise at least $50,000 to help cover postage, printing, the salary of our signature drive campaign director and the appeal to the SJC. Please donate on our website right now.
- Share information about the signature drive widely among your online and traditional personal networks. Like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter.
RTCD has made major strides over the
past several months with the formal submission of the petition to the Attorney
General’s office; hiring a statewide signature campaign director; establishing
regional campaign coordinators and linking with local community opposition
leaders across the Commonwealth.
But to achieve our mission, Repeal the
Casino Deal needs you to take action today.
Thank you in advance for your
commitment to volunteer, donate and engage your family and friends in your
community.
Sincerely,
John Ribeiro
Chairman
Repeal the Casino Deal
Winthrop
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