Town of Tuxedo residents have a plateful of change to consider Monday and Tuesday as there will be two Public Hearings — one on gaming and one to change George F. Baker High School to the Tuxedo STEM Academy Conversion Charter School.
The pace of the gambling application has accelerated rapidly with the Tuxedo Town Board ready to present and vote on a Host Agreement with Genting Americas as well present to the public town zoning changes that will create a Gaming Overlay District in the northern quadrant of the town. Monday’s meeting starts at 7:30 p.m. and takes place at George F. Baker High School.
Tuesday evening, while the Public Hearing to turn George F. Baker into a conversion charter school takes place at the high school, the Tuxedo Park Village Board will discuss and vote on a “Resolution of Support” that will accompany the Tuxedo’s Host Agreement to Albany, according to TPFYI.com. The meeting takes place at 7 p.m. at the Tuxedo Park village offices, complete with a public questions and comments period.
The Town of Tuxedo government has rallied to the Genting cause with a dizzying burst of speed and support for the Sterling Forest Resort project. Genting has already apparently deposited some three million dollars into a town escrow account to help cover consultant and impact evaluation fees, with the promise of some $50 million more on its way if Genting is awarded one of the four casino sites available from the NY Gaming Commission. According to a post on TPFY.com, the money would be used for town capital improvement projects.
@Sloatsburgny $3M for town to do their own due diligence. $340k closed Tuxedo’s school budget gap. Non-binding, non-refundable contribution.
— Michael Levoff (@MLevoff) June 6, 2014
Genting also recently gifted the Tuxedo Union Free School District a non-refundable or returnable $340,000 contribution.
If Tuxedo creates a Gaming Overlay District and Genting fails to win its Sterling Forest Resort bid, it’s unclear at this time would happen to the special gambling district.
Cover of Paul Davies investigative piece, Stacked. Cartoon by Charles R. Macauley (1871- 1934), reprinted from “Race-Track Gambling in New York,” Current Literature, April 1908.
Paul Davies tracks the river of money rolling through the whole New York gambling process, detailing some of the largesse Genting has spread around the state via consultant fees and other givebacks, quoting Christian Goode, Genting’s senior VP of development in the U.S., who said about Genting’s participation in the NY legislative process, ““We just want to make sure we’re properly represented.”
Davies’ eye-opening investigative piece on the whole NY gambling legislative process is called Stacked Deck: Inside the Politics of New York’s Dishonest Casino Plan. Genting operates the Resorts World racino at Aqueduct Race Track in Jamaica, NY, that has some 4,500 video slot machines and, according to Davies, pulls in some $60 million per month or “roughly $2 million a day.” Under Genting, Davies wrote that the racino at Aqueduct “has has become one of the most lucrative gambling operations in the country.”
The Sterling Forest Coalition will host author Robert S. Steele Thursday, June 26, at St. Mary’s in Tuxedo Episcopal Church at 7 p.m. Steele, a former Connecticut congressman, and will discuss the negative impacts of what happens when gambling moves into a small town community.
