9 Philadelphia Sites Recommended as Standalone Slot Casino

When Mayor Ed Rendell ran the city in the 1990s, he watched in frustration as thousands of city residents and visitors descended the Atlantic City Highway every week to gamble at New Jersey casinos.

Now, as governor, Rendell has gone to great lengths to keep gamblers at home by legalizing 14 casinos for Pennsylvania, including two that will be built here in the "City of Brotherhood," where he still lives.

But where exactly will these two gambling palaces be located? Is it near the massive Pennsylvania Convention Center in a busy downtown area known as the Center City? At one of the several places along the scenic Delaware River? Or at the hideous old industrial park in northern Philadelphia that was chosen by casino mogul Donald Trump?

It was the job of the Philadelphia Game Advisory Task Force, named by Mayor John F. Street in January, to recommend answers to these site questions.

The company delivered its 436-page report to Mr. Street on Thursday, recommending nine potential sites for two standalone slot vendors, each expected to have about 3,000 slot machines.

The final decision on which developers will get two casino licenses is up to the Pennsylvania Game Management Board. However, the seating recommendations from the city's task force are expected to have a significant impact on the seven-member state agency.

The task force has spent nine months investigating three key issues: where casinos should go, how much they can mean in terms of revenue and jobs, and what problems can be expected, such as increased traffic congestion, crime and gambling addiction.

"Game coming to Philadelphia could be the best or worst thing that's ever happened to us," Mr. Street said at a news conference Thursday at City Hall, a stately old building on Broad and Market Street.

"In some cities, the expected returns from gaming did not materialize, and in the end, it created nightmares for them," said Mr. Street, whose criminal problems have been compounded and more people have to be treated for gambling addiction.

"We are also concerned that putting thousands of slot machines in an inappropriate position can create a traffic nightmare."

However, he expressed confidence that such a problem would not occur in Philadelphia. He said he hoped casinos would be "part of" the solution to make Philadelphia more attractive to tourists and indigenous people by combining it with the Independence Hall and other historic landmarks, as well as other restaurants, universities, museums, art galleries, shops, theaters, nightclubs, and sports arenas.

The gaming task force said the city could expect thousands of new permanent jobs from the two casinos, as well as temporary construction jobs. In Philadelphia, up to $30 million will be generated for city finances from the 4% gaming "host fee" offered by law to the same corporation, the city and county.

In addition, the new state economic development fund, which will be funded by 5% of the total gaming revenue of 14 casinos, is expected to provide hundreds of millions of dollars for a large expansion of the Pennsylvania Convention Center, which opened in 1993.

The task force has spent months researching where to recommend placing the two gambling houses.

We listed three general districts within the city. Five districts lie along the Delaware River, which separates Philadelphia from Camden, N.J., two are near the downtown convention center, and two districts are about 10 miles from downtown, one on the western edge of the city, which lies north of Philadelphia and one on the border with Montgomery County.

Mr Street said he had not intentionally met casino developers before the report was published but would start doing so over the coming weeks.

All would-be developers must submit a standalone casino application to the State Gaming Commission by Dec. 28. The commission has up to 12 months to make a decision.

Robert Pickers, Trump's vice president, said Trump will definitely get a casino license for an 18-acre former industrial complex in northern Philadelphia called the Budsar Real Estate. The working class area, which includes old row houses and many empty industrial buildings, is called Nice Town.

This massive 10-story Buddha complex, with several empty brick structures, was once home to doors for cars and chassis for railroad cars. The Buddha is a block from the landmark Tasty Baking Company in Philadelphia, near the intersection of Route 1 and the Schuylkill Expressway.

Mr. Pickers said he liked it because it was about 10 miles from everyone but one of the competing areas. City officials said they didn't want the two new casinos to be too close to each other to avoid creating traffic jams.

"By expanding two casinos geographically, it reaches a broader overall [game] market and generates more revenue, and that benefits operators, cities, and states," Mr. Pickers said.

The only other casino site near Nicetown is a retail section a few miles west along Route 1, which borders Montgomery County. But local officials said Target's company is keeping an eye on the land for a new retail complex docked by a giant Target store.

Of the nine sites recommended by the Street Task Force, five stretch along the Delaware River. One is a city-owned vacant lot, which once housed an urban incinerator; not far away, a site in a neighborhood called PC Town, a waterfront property owned by Amerista Casino, a Las Vegas-based company that owns seven casinos across the United States.

A few miles south of these two sites, the third riverside site is now controlled by Hara's Casino, which it acquired a year ago when it acquired Caesar's Casino. The fourth site includes the sheet metal workers building near Hara's land, and the fifth is the sprawling former Philadelphia Naval Base in the southernmost part of the city.

It is not clear if casino developers will present proposals to build at all five locations. Harrer is not expected to pursue casinos within Philadelphia because he is a partner in a new racetrack/casino to be built along the state of Delaware in Chester, about 10 miles south of Philadelphia.

Mr. Street has expressed interest in having a minority-owned casino group consider installing casinos on the site of an incinerator. The group, led by Kenneth Trujillo, a lawyer for the city of Philadelphia who has political ties to Mr. Street and Mr. Rendell, is considering the idea.

American Star spokesman Kevin Pelley said his company would definitely propose building a $450 million project that would include a casino, retail, restaurant and entertainment in the Fishtown parcel, located not far from the incinerator site between the heavily traveled I-95 and the river.

Mr. Philly said the Fishtown neighborhood was "a working class neighborhood with a good mix of people, old residents, some immigrants, some gentrification, and many artists."

The other two casino sites are along Market Street on a busy street near the convention center. Sean Fordham, head of the Casino Task Force, said the benefits of having one casino there are that it can give convention visitors something to do.

Many convention participants have already scheduled overnight during their stay in Philadelphia to travel to Atlantic City, and Mr. Street is hoping to capture the market.

However, the two lots near the convention center are among the smallest of the nine potential sites, which can prove to be a drawback, Mr. Fordham said. Casino operators want to have all the slot machines on one floor, which requires a large footprint in the casino and can rule out two downtown locations, he added.

The Game Task Force's "Social Impact" subcommittee made some recommendations to city officials to mitigate the negative impact of slots.

It said it would hire about 70 to 100 additional city police officers to deal with theft, fights and other problems that may occur at casinos, and that city police would need to receive "specialized training in casino crimes" including counterfeiting, fraud and counterfeiting of checks. 에볼루션 바카라사이트

City health officials should educate residents on "problematic gambling discrimination" of family members, and the city should coordinate efforts with outside consultants and state health officials to develop addiction gamblers' treatment programs.