Mahoning Valley has no reason to support latest casino gambling proposal

EDITOR:

I’m not philosophically opposed to gambling. I’ll readily admit I enjoy visiting a casino once in a while. That’s where I learned that “ace-deuce” means “craps” in the gambling vernacular. And it’s how I know that the latest casino proposal to come down the pike in Ohio — or in this case not come down the pike to Youngstown — should come up craps in the Mahoning Valley.

Since 1990 each of the four groups that mounted pro-casino campaigns have claimed that gaming will create thousands of good paying jobs and billions in revenue for private business and state and local governments. Yet each of the proposals save for one, the 1996 initiative sponsored in part by DeBartolo Entertainment, has excluded the region in the state that has struggled longest and hardest to rebuild and revitalize its economy: our Valley. That’s outrageous.

But nothing that’s come before was quite as outrageous as the plan now being promoted by the Ohio Growth and Good Jobs Committee. Under their scheme, developers in Cleveland, Toledo, Cincinnati, and Columbus would be granted casino licenses while Youngstown is again denied a seat at the table.

That’s right, Columbus and Cincinnati with unemployment rates that have averaged less than half of ours over the past five years each get a casino and the thousands of jobs that go with them. We get zip. Zero. Zilch. Nothing. Nada — except for a few bucks in casino revenue that is intended to buy our support and our silence.

Here’s another outrage: along with touting economic development, the folks at Growth and Good Jobs have trotted out the other clich casino backers always use: the lost revenue card. They lament the fact that thousand of Ohioans gamble hundreds of millions of bucks in neighboring states every year. They’re right about that.

They then boast that their plan will help recapture most of those dollars. They’re wrong about that, if the proposal deals out Youngstown.

To see why, take a look at a map of Ohio and surrounding states. Find Youngstown. Then find Chester, WV, the home of Mountaineer Racetrack and Gaming Resort. You don’t have to be Magellan to figure out that it’s less than an hour’s drive from the Valley. That’s why Mountaineer’s parking lot is filled night and day with cars sporting Ohio license plates from Mahoning, Trumbull and the counties south and west of us.

The people driving those cars have two things in common: they all want to gamble and they all live closer to Youngstown than they do to Cleveland. A lot closer.

Which means if they had a choice between going to a casino in Youngstown or one in Cleveland they’re choosing Youngstown almost every time. That would be good for the state. It would be good for our Valley. But, it wouldn’t be good for Cleveland where some of the big money people behind the plan just happen to live and own property.

That’s why they won’t allow a casino to be built here. It’s also why we should do everything we can to make sure they’re not allowed to build one anywhere else.

As I said in the first paragraph, I’m not opposed to the latest casino scheme because I opposed to gambling.

I’m opposed because Youngstown and the surrounding communities are being dealt out of the game once again.

And so here’s a message for the people at the Ohio Growth and Good Jobs Committee:

Don’t talk about job creation and economic development on one hand and slap the people who need those jobs most with the other.

Don’t try to buy us off with a few chips from the blackjack tables in Cleveland, Toledo, Cincinnati, and Columbus when we need jobs dealing blackjack right here, right now.

Don’t throw us a few nickels from your slots for our schools when those schools need the millions of dollars in property taxes they’d receive if a casino housing a couple thousand slots was built downtown.

And please don’t expect us to sign your petitions or vote for your plan.

After all, we know a lot about gambling here in the Valley. We can see a bad play from a million miles away and this one just keeps coming up craps.

Atty. DAVID J. BETRAS

Canfield