The Massachusetts Gaming Commission's anticipated vote Friday to license the state's first casino in Springfield may spur economic activity experts say could boost public confidence in expanded gaming and counter the negative view pushed by the repeal campaign.
"We've heard a lot of discussion about the potential negative impacts, but we haven't seen any of the benefits," said Clyde Barrow, a gaming expert at University of Massachusetts Dartmouth. "It's been an asymmetrical debate up to this point. I think it becomes very important to see some of the benefits starting to occur, with construction jobs and hiring. It will certainly shift it back to the direction of where it was two years ago, when most of the discussion was about the benefits."
The commission will decide whether to license MGM, the only player left for a western Massachusetts casino after four others shifted sites or pulled out of the state. Chairman Stephen Crosby called the upcoming vote the culmination of "a tremendous amount of work" that "was required to take this several-page law and turn it into an industry."
"It's very exciting," Crosby said. "This is the beginning of the jobs and the revenue, and that's what it's all about."
MGM says it can break ground in Springfield as early as July if it receives approval Friday. The company expects to generate $500 million annually — a quarter of which will flow to the state — and pay $25 million a year to Springfield. The project, which has a 2017 completion date, is expected to create 3,000 permanent jobs and 2,000 construction jobs.
"The MGM team and the City of Springfield have worked cooperatively and diligently to reach this point in the licensing process," MGM President Michael Mathis said in a statement. "Springfield and its people have earned this moment, and MGM looks forward to sharing this milestone with them."
The casino repeal campaign — which is awaiting the Supreme Judicial Court's ruling on if a repeal question will be allowed on the November ballot — says "momentum is clearly on the side of repealing this wrong-headed law" and "investing instead in sustainable economic development for Springfield and the rest of Massachusetts."
"Springfield is struggling and we know it can do better than a casino to sap local jobs, kill local businesses and profit on the backs of local residents," a repeal spokesman said. "MGM is obviously worried about our momentum — their local leaders sat in on the SJC arguments and they have asked for a delay in the awarding of their license until voters have a chance to vote on repeal."
But Boston College professor and gaming expert Richard McGowan said construction in Springfield will provide a powerful example of the stimulating effect a casino can have in a community that wants it.
"I think it's going to make it even harder for the repeal to go through to be quite blunt, especially in the western part of the state," McGowan said of Friday's vote. "What might change things is if MGM doesn't deliver on what they say they're going to do out there. That would hurt."
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