Rolling the Dice

Coverage of casino licensing and the gambling referendum

Revere-Everett casino scuffle on tap, but action moves to SJC

By CommonWealth Staff 0 Comments Feb 26, 2014

As Revere casino supporters salivate over the their victory, the Bay State casino wars shift from the ballot box to the courtroom. The showdown with Everett over the eastern Massachusetts license gets second billing to the fight over a possible ballot question that would put a full scale repeal before Bay State voters in November. Attorney(...)

Losing your shirt – and your home – at the casino

By Michael Jonas 0 Comments Feb 10, 2014

It’s a well-known truism in the casino world that the house always wins. Less well known is the fact that sometimes, apparently, what the house wins is your house. On Sunday, the Globe’s Mark Arsenault had a revealing look at the hardball tactics used by both Connecticut casinos to collect casino debts, measures that sometimes(...)

Fall River goes all in – again

By CommonWealth Staff Economics 0 Comments Jan 28, 2014

The last time a casino deal blew up on Fall River Mayor Will Flanagan, he shrugged it off as the cost of rolling the dice. Flanagan’s gambling had nearly blown up a large biotech deal in town and angered the governor’s office, and Flanagan had no casino to show for his efforts, but none of(...)

Community is once again being dealt bad hand

By James Aloisi 0 Comments Jan 21, 2014

I’ve been supporting the community activists in East Boston who are working mightily to oppose the proposed Suffolk Downs casino. These activists are not simply saying “no” to the casino – they are also advancing a positive, forward-looking vision for the site and their community, one that focuses on attracting 21st century jobs to a(...)

Up in smoke?

By Jack Sullivan 0 Comments Nov 21, 2013

It’s kind of hard to say there’s a chasm between voters and politicians in deciding what’s best for the state, given that the voters put these folks into office and continue to pull the lever for them. But you have to wonder if anyone’s listening to the other side when you look at the disparity(...)

Another casino setback

By CommonWealth Staff 0 Comments Nov 20, 2013

Small town Massachusetts has spoken and it seems that many of them don’t want casinos. Milford, a MetroWest town of 25,000, soundly defeated a host community agreement with Crossroads Massachusetts, a casino development group led by Foxwoods Connecticut and Colorado real estate developer David Nunes. The much-anticipated Milford vote deflates the state’s fledging casino quest.(...)

Casino confusion on Vineyard

By CommonWealth Staff 0 Comments Nov 19, 2013

The Massachusetts casino hunt has turned upside-down, and then flipped upside-down again. The wild turns of fortune now have wild turns of their own. The Aquinnah Wampanoag tribe threw the state for a loop last week, announcing plans to open a federally-permitted gambling facility on their Martha’s Vineyard reservation soon. And this week, tribal voters(...)

Suffolk down but not out

By CommonWealth Staff 0 Comments Nov 12, 2013

Boston lost a protracted, petty-looking battle to bring a proposed Everett casino into its orbit earlier this year. Now, with Boston Mayor Tom Menino’s former casino dance partner Suffolk Downs rebuffed by East Boston voters and eyeing a massive gambling facility just across the city line in Revere, Boston faces the prospect of re-running the(...)

Darwin rolls the dice

By Jack Sullivan 0 Comments Nov 7, 2013

Now that the dust is settling, you have to wonder when it comes to casino permits: What the heck do we need a Gaming Commission for? There’s a sort of Darwinian process of natural selection going on in the decision to site casinos in Massachusetts, and it appears voters are the ones taking the bull(...)

Against all odds, casino vote in doubt

By Michael Jonas 0 Comments Nov 4, 2013

In the gambling world, the house always wins. In the case of a bid to build a billion dollar casino in East Boston, the house is Suffolk Downs and its well-wired investors. Until recently, it was also Caesars Entertainment, and its bloviating CEO Gary Loveman. And it’s the mayor and the House speaker, a political(...)