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Sunday, August 31, 2014

The Failure of Atlantic City: "....It doesn’t trickle down. “






The last old home on a block, center left, is seen near the Revel hotel and casino in Atlantic City, N.J.
 
The last old home on a block, center left, is seen near the Revel hotel and casino in Atlantic City, N.J.
Mel Evans/AP
 
Impending casino closures foreground Atlantic City’s great divide
Updated
 
When her hometown first legalized casino gambling in 1976, Atlantic City native Turiyah Abdur-Raheem had her doubts.

“I wasn’t here then, I was still away at college, but I was concerned about my family and friends who still lived here,” said Raheem. “I think my biggest concern was whether or not people in the community were going to really benefit; or was it going to still be a situation where these casinos and other casino-related businesses were going to thrive, and the community was going to suffer.”

That was nearly four decades ago. For three of those decades, Raheem lived elsewhere. When she returned to her hometown in 2008, what she found was “heartbreaking,” she says.
“It benefits one side of the city and not the other. It doesn’t trickle down.
Atlantic City councilman-at-large Moisse Delgado
“I was hearing more and more stories about hopelessness, about people not being able to be hired,” said Raheem, the author of a recent book about growing up in “the other Atlantic City.” “Last hired, first fired. Whereas we always had jobs as teenagers, the teenagers here were not being hired. Other teenagers were able to come in and get work, and our teenagers were not.”
For Abdur-Raheem and some other residents of Atlantic City, impending casino closures are just another bump in the community’s long, fraught relationship with legalized gaming. They see an industry that has grown fat in their backyard, while sharing little of the profit. In 2010, Atlantic City casinos took in $3.6 billion; meanwhile, the city’s median household income between 2008 and 2012 was just under $30,000.

Yet the gaming industry nationwide is on the ascent, even as three major Atlantic City casinos threaten to close within the next few weeks. Roughly two decades ago, casinos could only be found in six states; as of last year, 22 states have commercial casinos, according to an American Gaming Association (AGA) survey [PDF]. That same survey found that casinos raked in $37.34 billion nationwide in 2012. Only in 2007, the year before the financial collapse, did the industry collect more in revenue.
Melissa Harris-Perry, 8/31/14, 10:49 AM ET

The changing face of Atlantic City

MSNBC contributor Dorian Warren, Carmen Rita Wong from NYU Poly Tech, MSNBC.com’s Ned Resnikoff and Michael Pollock from the Spectrum Gaming Group join to discuss the changing face of Atlantic City and the closing of some of its major casinos.

The question facing Atlantic City, and a growing number of other communities around the United States, is where all that revenue goes. While industry spokespeople argue that commercial casinos do wonders for a local economy, not all Atlantic City residents agree.

“It benefits one side of the city and not the other. It doesn’t trickle down,” said Atlantic City councilman-at-large Moisse Delgado. “Tourism dollars are good for the industry. It’s not as much for the municipality and its residents.”

A significant chunk of the city’s revenue does come from casinos. According to Atlantic City’s 2013 audit report [PDF], local government collects about 65% of its taxes from the gaming industry. While in earlier times that might have allowed the city to share in the industry’s prosperity, today it means the municipality has no safety net when casino revenues decline. Earlier this month, Atlantic City Revenue and Finance director Michael Stinson told Reuters that impending casino closures could wipe out as much as half of the city’s tax base.

Adding to the city’s financial woes, its unemployment rate is markedly higher than the national average, and wages tend to be lower. Delgado alleges that’s because “front of the house” casino jobs – relatively high-paying jobs that require a greater degree of customer interface, such as tending bar or manning the blackjack tables – usually go to people who don’t live within city limits.

“People who have those jobs don’t live on this island,” he said. “They live in farther towns. They live 60 minutes away, two hours away. They don’t call it home, they don’t see it as home, they don’t invest in home.”

People who live in the city – most of whom are either African American or Latino – do the back of the house jobs, such as cleaning rooms and doing line cook work, said Delgado. But Joe Kelly, president of the Greater Atlantic City Chamber of Commerce, argued casinos “have done a wonderful job in creating employment opportunities.”

“I don’t think that’s consistent with what I’ve seen,” he said of Delgado’s concerns. “I’ve seen a number of professionals come through the local market that have gone on to take leadership roles in the casinos that were local citizens.”

For industry leaders and experts, the watchword in Atlantic City is “diversification.” The local Chamber of Commerce is trying to resuscitate business in Atlantic City by expanding tourism and hospitality services beyond just gambling. If that effort is successful, the city will come to more closely resemble Las Vegas, where gambling now accounts for just about 36% of revenue in the main tourism center known as the Las Vegas Strip. Dining, musical entertainment and retail have come to occupy a larger chunk of that city’s income. Industry analysts believe that developing those industries in Atlantic City would help to distinguish it from the myriad other Mid-Atlantic towns that now host casinos.

“It’s a tourism destination,” said Sara Rayme, senior vice president of public affairs for the AGA.

“As more markets have come online, clearly it’s up to the policy makers in tandem with the operators to make sure their business models are evolving and changing with what’s going on around them.”
“As an Atlantic City native, I can see it’s definitely been a boon.”
David Schwartz, the director of the University of Nevada
Rayme also believes that casinos have been good to Atlantic City overall, saying “gaming has been incredibly successful in Atlantic City for the past 30 years.” The AGA estimates that Atlantic City casinos have “directly supported 1.4 million jobs” and “generated $9.3 billion in tax revenue,” according to a fact sheet [PDF] shared by Rayme.
David Schwartz, the director of the University of Nevada, Las Vegas’ Center for Gaming Research, said “the city was completely moribund” before legalized gambling.

“As an Atlantic City native, I can see it’s definitely been a boon,” he said. “Created a lot of jobs, brought in a lot of development.”

The Federal Reserve of Philadelphia has expressed a little more ambivalence regarding the industry’s effects. In a recent survey [PDF] of the available literature regarding gambling’s economic impact, the Philadelphia Fed found that casino revenue can do some good for state tax revenues and generate jobs; however, the same report offered a grim prognosis for Atlantic City’s gambling industry.

Another report focusing on Atlantic City in particular [PDF] noted that the local gaming industry “has typically provided jobs for more than 10,000 city residents,” but added that “many of the problems that gambling was supposed to alleviate remain severe.”

The paradox of Atlantic City, they write, is that it is “a place where plentiful jobs are juxtaposed with high levels of poverty and unemployment.” The way forward is not yet clear.




http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/atlantic-city-casinos-boon-for-city-not-residents



 

The Nation is Watching...





Join with your friends and neighbors to protect ALL Massachusetts.....Opposition is GROWING!


Friend,
As you may know, our first financial reporting period of the year ends tonight at midnight. Our email on Wednesday broke records for us in terms of both the number of donations and amount raised for a single day - but we still have work to do to reach our goal of 250 contributions before the fundraising deadline.
The strength of our grassroots organization will be judged on how we do today. Who is watching? Voters across the nation. "The November vote will be closely watched as a bellwether of the [casino] industry's future."
We may not be able to cut million dollar checks like the casino bosses, but we need to show that we have something they don't - small donors committed to protecting the future of Massachusetts.
We hope you enjoy the rest of your Labor Day weekend. 65 days to victory!
Together, we'll defeat the casino industry.
John Ribeiro
Chairman
Repeal the Casino Deal



Repeal the Casino Deal | PO Box 520162 | Winthrop | MA | 02152







 

Penn National: 200 CONSTRUCTION JOBS = 6,500 ?


Flawed arithmetic and overstated projections!
Filled with phony promises!

That's the Gambling Industry!



Penn National’s chief operating officer, as he looked out the other day on 200 workers; soon, 1,000 workers will be on the site.


6,500 construction jobs

Massachusetts May Shut Down Casinos Before Even One Opens

Defining Gambling


Nothing defines the failures of GAMBLING better than Atlantic City!

REPEAL THE CASINO DEAL!







Death of Atlantic City casinos could be omen for N.Y.


...casino death watch...




Local casinos won't cure money woes

Saturday, August 30, 2014

Atlantic City Losing 2 Casinos, 5,000 Jobs in 3 Days




Atlantic City Losing 2 Casinos, 5,000 Jobs in 3 Days

 
                                    This July 11, 2014 aerial photo shows Trump Plaza, left, and Caesars Atlantic City, right, on the Atantic City N.J. Boardwalk. A report issued Aug. 29, 2014 by Wall Street firm Fitch Ratings predicts much of the gambling revenue from Trump Plaza and two other casinos closing down soon, Revel and the Showboat, will remain in Atlantic City after they are gone. (AP Photo/Wayne Parry)
This July 11, 2014 aerial photo shows Trump Plaza, left, and Caesars Atlantic City, right, on the Atantic City N.J. Boardwalk. A report issued Aug. 29, 2014 by Wall Street firm Fitch Ratings predicts much of the gambling revenue from Trump Plaza and two other casinos closing down soon, Revel and the Showboat, will remain in Atlantic City after they are gone. (AP Photo/Wayne Parry)
The Associated Press

Friday, August 29, 2014

Charlie Baker: The Flip Flopper!




Massachusetts voters rejected Charlie Baker last time he ran....and for good reason!

Charlie Baker hasn't learned anything!









Do NOT vote for Baker. He wants to overturn the repeal.



 

If the effort to repeal the casino effort passes in November, and Republican...
MASSLIVE.COM


 


Baker also does not get the IMPACT of one Casino on Indian Tribe rights under the Indiam Gaming Rights Act of 1988.


Briefly, one Casino (Or authorization of Slots ANYWHERE in Ma. give Indian Tribes rights under IGRA. Essentially, until a State authorizes Casinos with Slot Machines, Indians cannot open Casinos with Slot Machines on Tribal Land


Baker does not have the brains to feel embarrassed about such a corrupt and ignorant position and statement. He sees big dollar $$$$$$$$$ign$$$$$$$$$$$ and flies to them like a mosquito to a trap. Good work casino con artists.




v

Vietnamese drug gang abducted three men, after they GAMBLED $$$ at Harrah's Chester PA



Massachusetts ‘GAMING’ Future
This is what's lurking inside your local casinos!
 
Daily News - August 28, 2014 - Vietnamese drug gang abducted three men, dumped bodies in Philadelphia river.
Two brothers were loaned $100,000 to buy drugs, but spent it all at a Chester, Penn. casino [Harrah's Chester Casino And Racetrack] before being abducted by a Philadelphia drug lords. Their throats were slit before being dumped in the Schuylkill River with a third man who survived the abduction.





Vietnamese drug gang abducted three men, dumped bodies in Philadelphia river: police

Two brothers were loaned $100,000 to buy drugs, but spent it all at a Chester, Penn. casino before being abducted by a Philadelphia drug lords. Their throats were slit before being dumped in the Schuylkill River with a third man who survived the abduction.

 
 
 
The two men whose bodies were pulled out of a Philadelphia river owed drug dealers $100,000 they wasted at a Chester casino.
 
Investigators have been searching a house in southwest Philadelphia where three men including the survivor of a Tuesday night abduction were reportedly tortured by members of a Vietnamese gang, according to a WPVI-TV report.
 
The dilapidated house had been deserted by the time investigators busted down its door Wednesday night, but neighbors said the family that lived there had already packed up and left hours after two bodies were dumped in the Schuylkill River.
 
Buckets of roof cement identical to what was used to weigh down two bodies in the river were also found at the house.
 
It’s believed the family — a couple and their five children — that fled also owned a property across the street where they had a marijuana grow operation in a trailer with big dogs, the TV station wrote.
 
The bizarre investigation involving the death of two brothers started after a 23-year-old identified as Thanh Voong was found wandering in hysterics near Fairmount Park while bound, blindfolded and barely clothed flagged down a cop.
 
He played dead after a group of men slit their throats on the river shore and dumped him and the brothers in the river after a night of torture.

 
“It’s one of the more barbaric murders I’ve seen,” Capt. James Clark of Philadelphia Police told Philly.com.
 
Voong survived despite having several stab wounds, but swam to shore after the suspects left because he wasn’t weighed down with buckets of roof cement like the other victims.
 
Investigators have deemed the two deaths as drug and gang-related after the pair were allegedly given $100,000 to buy drugs. However, they spent it all at Harrah’s Casino in Chester, WPVI-TV reported.
 
The brothers have not been identified, but they are reportedly from Vietnam.
 
When they came up short on cash, they were abducted and taken to the Philadelphia house to be tortured. It’s there they were allowed one phone call. They chose Voong to bring in the cash they owed or else they would be killed, according to Philly.com.
 
But Voong only scrapped together $40,000.
 
It’s there he was bound and tortured just like the others, a detail that conflicts with a prior report from police that he was grabbed off a street in west Philadelphia and robbed in the back of a van.
 
Voong is well-known to local authorities after being targeted in July and early August.
He was attacked with a hammer on Aug. 9 after being pulled out of his car in Southwest Center City, police reports show.