Tuesday, November 21, 2006

Expect to hear a lot about gambling expansion in the coming months. West
Virginia's four racetrack casinos should make another push in the
Legislature for local option elections to allow table games. They want
people in the four counties with racinos -- Kanawha, Ohio, Hancock and
Jefferson -- to vote on allowing games such as blackjack, poker and roulette
along with the slot machines they have now. Gambling supporters will argue
that West Virginia is about to fall behind in the arms race for gaming
entertainment dollars. It's an argument West Virginians should be very wary
of. On Tuesday of last week, Pennsylvania's first slot casino opened for
business. According to The Associated Press, hundreds of gamblers, mostly
senior citizens who had waited hours in a foggy drizzle, poured into the
casino near Wilkes-Barre. Most of the 1,100 slot machines were occupied
within 10 minutes of the doors opening. Gov. Ed Rendell praised the casino's
opening as an important step in delivering property tax relief. Opponents of
gambling expansion predicted an increase in crime and other social problems.
The Pennsylvania Legislature has authorized as many as 61,000 slot machines
at 14 locations. Meanwhile, gambling supporters in Maryland hope Gov.-elect
Martin O'Malley will be more successful in bringing legal slots to that
state than outgoing Gov. Robert Erlich has been. O'Malley opposes casino
gambling and favors only a limited number of slot machines at tracks, and
even then mainly to preserve the horse racing industry and the farms that
support it, according to the AP. Maryland track owners say they are hurt by
competition from tracks in Delaware and West Virginia, which also have
slots. That sounds similar to what the racetrack casino owners in West
Virginia say about the upcoming competition from Pennsylvania slot casinos.

In at least one case, a casino owner is protecting itself by investing in
both states. MRT Gaming Group Inc., which owns Mountaineer Racetrack and
Gaming Resort in Hancock County, has an $80 million slot casino under
construction near Erie, Pa.

So the pressure for West Virginia to get ahead in this gambling version of
an arms race will be there for legislators this coming year. It might be out
in the open. It might be behind the scenes. But a lot of arm-twisting will
be going on.

Nothing we have heard leads us to change our position on table games. The
topic needs a full debate. It must be discussed statewide, because the
benefits and the social costs will be felt statewide. It requires a
statewide vote.

Together, the counties with the four tracks with slots have about 18 percent
of the state's population. That is too small a group to make such a large
decision for everyone. Anyway, what happens at a racetrack casino in one
county affects neighboring counties. Most of Cabell County is closer to the
Cross Lanes racetrack than parts of Kanawha County are.

Earlier this month, Ohio voters turned down a proposal to have slot casinos
in their state. The result is not as important as the fact that people
everywhere got to vote on this important issue. West Virginia voters -- all
of them -- deserve that shame chance.

Expanding gambling is an important decision that goes beyond jobs and
tourism dollars. It deals with who we want to be and what we want our state
to be. That's too much for the people of four counties to decide.