Gaming giants and real-estate honchos are placing all their chips on the desk to win one among three coveted licenses to function a on line casino in or round New York Metropolis.
“There’s nonetheless a big market for land-based casinos on this nation and the New York Metropolis metropolitan market specifically,” stated Albany Regulation Faculty Professor Bennett Liebman, a former deputy secretary to the governor for gaming and racing, to The Publish.
Gaming pursuits have already spent tens of millions of {dollars} on lobbying and media consultants to make their case to native and state officers as deadlines creep nearer to submit bids subsequent yr.
Listed here are the deep-pocketed contenders:
MANHATTAN
Location: Hudson Yards
Title: Wynn New York Metropolis
Developer: Associated Corporations/Wynn Resorts.
Particulars: $12 billion on line casino complicated that features a lodge, workplace house, residences, and a 5.6-acre park
Execs: Enhance to adjoining Javits Conference Middle, views of Hudson River, entry to the Excessive Line
Cons: Associates of the Excessive Line are spearheading group opposition, native elected officers not enthused by mission, both.
Location: Occasions Sq.
Title: Caesars Palace Occasions Sq.
Developer: Caesars Leisure, SL Inexperienced and Jay-Z Roc Nation
Particulars: $4 billion on line casino complicated that may be constructed at 1515 Broadway within the coronary heart of Occasions Sq..
Execs: Jay-Z curates the leisure, and there’s entry to the Nice White Means.
Cons: Opposition from theater producers — the Broadway League — and the No Occasions Sq. coalition that features neighborhood teams
Location: Far West Facet
Title: Avenir
Developer: Silverstein Properties/Greenwood Gaming and Leisure
Particulars: World Commerce Middle developer Larry Silverstein is spearheading the plan, which includes a 1.8 million-square-foot mission for a lodge, on line casino, leisure and residential complicated on vacant land at West forty first Road and eleventh Avenue, simply north of the Jacob Javits Middle.
Execs: As with Wynn NYC, the Avenir can be a lift to the Javits Conference Middle and tourism business.
Cons: Overcoming native opposition will likely be a problem.
Location: Fifth Avenue
Title: Saks Fifth Avenue On line casino
Developer: Saks Fifth Avenue and Hudson’s Bay Firm
Particulars: The posh division retailer at 611 Fifth Ave. between East forty ninth and East fiftieth streets — subsequent to St. Patrick’s Cathedral — desires to convey high-rollers to the house of excessive trend on the highest flooring of its flagship constructing.
Execs: Elevated foot visitors for a Fifth Avenue damage by the COVID-19 pandemic
Cons: Group opposition. Would want divine intervention to find a on line casino subsequent to New York’s most cherished Catholic church
Location: Midtown East River
Title: Freedom Plaza
Developer: Metropolis real-estate scion Stefan Soloviev and Mohegan Solar
Particulars: 4 towers alongside the East River that would come with residences and resorts with an underground on line casino
Execs: Bid features a “Freedom Museum” and 6.7 acres of inexperienced house
Cons: Opposition from native politicians
QUEENS
Location: South Ozone Park-Jamaica
Title: Resorts World New York Metropolis at Aqueduct
Developer: Genting/Resorts World On line casino
Particulars: The bidder, which already owns an current slots parlor, has proposed a $5 billion plan that features a pitch to broaden its present operations and likewise provide dwell desk video games corresponding to black jack and craps. The proposal features a new 7,000-seat live performance venue and sports activities coaching facility.
Execs: Its slots parlor, which opened in 2011, has generated greater than $4 billion for state coffers, and its bid has sturdy area people and political help.
Cons: Resorts World Las Vegas — a separate on line casino that’s a part of the identical Genting empire — is ensnared in an alleged unlawful bookmaking scandal involving the interpreter of baseball famous person Shohei Ohtani.
Location: Willets Factors/Flushing Meadows/Corona
Title: Metropolitan Park
Developer: Mets proprietor Steve Cohen and Arduous Rock Worldwide
Particulars: Sprawling $8 billion gaming middle, lodge and music venue close to the Mets’ Citi Discipline stadium.
Execs: A part of an ongoing reclamation mission to spruce up concrete parcels round Citi Discipline and Willets Level, a plan that individually features a skilled soccer stadium and housing. The mission touts entry to twenty acres of inexperienced house and Flushing Bay.
Cons: Cohen has not but received approval from the state legislature to transform the designated parkland property eyed for the mission to be used as a on line casino leisure complicated due to opposition from native state Sen. Jessica Ramos. Plan additionally may reduce into Genting Resort World at Aqueduct’s current slots enterprise simply miles away.
BROOKLYN
Location: Coney Island
Title: The Coney
Developer: Thor Equities, Chickasaw Nation’s World Gaming Options, Saratoga On line casino Holdings and Legends Hospitality Group
Particulars: $3 billion “Coney” on line casino, lodge and conference corridor erected simply steps from the storied Brooklyn boardwalk and seaside, smack between the positioning’s iconic Cyclone and Marvel Wheel
Execs: Would assist rejuvenate Coney Island as a significant vacationer vacation spot
Cons: Native Group Board 13 voted overwhelmingly towards the mission, with opponents saying they don’t need the enduring seaside to be became Atlantic Metropolis.
BRONX
Location: Ferry Level
Title: Bally’s On line casino
Developer: Bally’s
Particulars: Bally’s acquired the lease to run the golf course at Ferry Level from the Trump Group and now hopes to transform parts of the positioning’s car parking zone and apply vary, which depend as parkland, right into a on line casino middle.
Execs: Situated on the foot of the Whitestone Bridge, the on line casino would have quick access from Queens, The Bronx, Lengthy Island and Westchester County. Waterfront views of the East River and Lengthy Island Sound
Cons: As with the Cohen mission, Bally’s wants legislative approval to transform the parkland for industrial use.
NASSAU COUNTY, LI
Location: Uniondale
Title: Sands New York
Developer: Las Vegas Sands
Particulars: The Sands secured a lease from Nassau County to transform the Nassau Veterans Memorial Museum Coliseum right into a on line casino complicated with a dwell efficiency theater, a lodge and wellness spa, eating and conference house.
Execs: Huge Nassau-Suffolk market not far Queens border, sturdy help from Republican-led authorities
Cons: Robust opposition spearheaded by close by Hofstra College
YONKERS
Location: Yonkers Raceway
Title: Empire Metropolis
Developer: MGM Resorts Worldwide
Particulars: The Raceway launched slot-machine-style gaming in 2006 with its Empire Metropolis On line casino. Now it’s aiming for a full-on gaming license with a $3 billion growth plan that may provide dwell desk bets.
Execs: As with Resorts World at Aqueduct, it has a observe report of success and native help.
Cons: Gaming professional Liebman describes MGM’s preliminary proposal as “underwhelming,” particularly compared to the Hudson Yards, Cohen, Occasions Sq. and Sands proposals. “If different glitzier proposals really attain the Gaming Facility Location Board, can they compete?” he stated of Yonkers.
Each Liebman and John Sabini, former chairman of the state racing and wagering board, advised The Publish that the prevailing slots-parlor bidders — at Aqueduct and Yonkers — are the “favorites” to win two of the licenses.
They’ve each been tax-generating money cows for the state for greater than a decade and luxuriate in sturdy native political help, the consultants famous.
Revenues from the gaming corporations who’re awarded the brand new on line casino licenses will assist fund the Metropolitan Transportation Authority.
“I’d say the `racinos’ are the favorites. They’ve a observe report of being a companion with the state for a very long time,” Sabini stated.
The present parlors is probably not shoo-ins, notably when their proposals are judged towards a few of the competing dazzling plans, the consultants stated.
However group and political opposition to the opposite plans may matter greater than the proposals’ deserves, they stated.
“There’s going to be opposition to each proposal,” stated Sabini, who notably was skeptical of any Manhattan pitch that survives the evaluate course of.
Genting Resorts World spent $2.87 million lobbying in Albany final yr to attempt to persuade foes of its plan’s deserves.
Cohen and his companion additionally doled out greater than $2.5 million mixed pitching their plan.
Given hostility to a brand new on line casino in Manhattan, each gaming consultants rated Las Vegas Sands’ bid a severe contender for the third license up for grabs.
“The Sands proposal might be the strongest proposal proper now. Lengthy Island/Nassau-Suffolk is a reasonably good market,” Sabini stated.
The proposals should safe a two-thirds vote from elected officers on native six-member Group Advisory Committees earlier than even being thought-about by a statewide gaming facility location board after which the state Gaming Fee.
Liebman stated Huge Apple Mayor Eric Adams’ current political woes, triggered by a number of federal probes of his administration, is an “added wildcard” that might affect the choice course of.
“If the commonly pro-casino Adams is now not the mayor and doesn’t appoint an advisory committee member, doesn’t this make the method even tougher for many of the New York Metropolis-based on line casino tasks?,” the prof stated.
The profitable bidders should pay the state a minimal $500 million up-front license charge.
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