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Rumors circulating about someone coming in to revive the financially struggling Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation’s Foxwoods casino project along the waterfront were confirmed last week when a Vegas gaming mogul with several high-profile casinos to his name announced his involvement.
Feb. 23, Wynn Resorts revealed its participation in Foxwoods with the Philadelphia Entertainment and Development Partners, a group made up of Washington Philadelphia Investors LP, which owns 70 percent of the partnership, and Foxwoods Development Co. LLC, which owns 30 percent of the partnership, via a letter of intent to the Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board, With Wynn Resorts’ Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Steven A. Wynn’s commitment, it was disclosed an affiliate of his would act as a manager and managing general partner in the Delaware waterfront casino upon the gaming control board’s approval.
“I am thrilled to be returning to the East Coast and in particular to the city in which I was privileged to have gained my college education … Philadelphia has always felt like home to me,” Wynn, a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania, said in a statement.
Wynn Resorts owns Wynn Las Vegas, a hotel and casino on the Las Vegas Strip; Encore, a 2008 expansion of Wynn Las Vegas; and Wynn Macau, a casino resort in China. He also was at the helm of the Golden Nugget in Atlantic City, N.J., in the 1980s.
The untitled new project, which may or may not be dubbed Foxwoods, is expected to have 1,500 slots operating by May 29, 2011.
“I’m building 3,000 slot machines and a bunch of table games and a poker room, an Italian restaurant, a steakhouse, an Asian restaurant because I’m two blocks from a Vietnamese neighborhood,” Wynn said according to published reports of the Washington Avenue area.
The site will not include a hotel that was part of the original plans, but would not be “slots in a box,” Wynn said according to reports. And it would not be a destination resort to lure in high-rollers, he added, since the area is “full of my old friends — Italians and Jews and every conceivable stripe of ethic group that love to shoot craps and gamble,” he said. “And they’re 10 minutes away in their cars or on a bus from my casino on the Delaware Riverfront. I love the proximity to these people.”
Queen Village Neighbors Association President Jeff Rush was not surprised by the announcement.
“Initially I thought that Mr. Wynn could have potentially brought something to the table in a positive way,” the resident of Columbus Boulevard and Christian Street said.
However, when Wynn said the proposed casino at Columbus and Reed Street would be “the cutest casino you have ever seen,” according to published reports, Rush’s original concerns such as quality-of-life issues and traffic congestion resurfaced.
Casino Free Philadelphia attorney Paul Boni saw the announcement as a victory and the start of a new battle.
“We were happy that Foxwoods is dead,” he said, “and that what’s been constantly told to us or described to us as a done deal is not the case … And at some point, Steve Wynn will skulk away from Philadelphia with his tail between his legs.”
Paperwork for a change of ownership to Wynn had not been filed by press time and was not scheduled to be addressed at yesterday’s 10 a.m. hearing that ended about 4 p.m. with Foxwoods retaining its licence — although, according to published reports, the change of ownership most likely will be happening.
“That’s a completely different process,” gaming control board spokesman Richard McGarvey said.
As decided at the Jan. 27 meeting, the board has been fining Foxwoods $2,000 a day retroactively to Dec. 1 when the group missed a filing deadline for construction drawings and a timeline for all phases of the facility. Foxwoods claimed pending table game legislation, which has since been passed, made it difficult to receive a commitment from a financier without knowing the outcome of the bill and the expected financier would dictate the plans, according to a motion Foxwoods’ lawyers filed the day before the deadline. The fine calculated to $186,000 as of yesterday, but will continue to accumulate until the next meeting with the board April 29.
“This hearing is to say why should the board not continue these fines or do something more drastic,” McGarvey said of yesterday’s session in Harrisburg.
Foxwoods was awarded its license, along with SugarHouse, which is on the waterfront in Fishtown, in December ’06. Foxwoods had proposed to build a resort of slots, restaurants, shops, a showroom, a hotel, a parking garage and a spa, among other amenities, over three phases.
Following a battle from neighboring communities, such as Pennsport and Queen Village, City officials urged Foxwoods in September ’08 to contemplate a move to Eighth and Market streets, which they agreed to do. Upon renewing its license in August, the group also requested the gaming control board approve a move to the Center City location. The board agreed to extend the license only if the casino stayed put.
At that same meeting, the board laid out a timeline of nine conditions Foxwoods was expected to meet, including the Dec. 1 cut off.
While the board did not think Foxwoods was in compliance with deadlines, it did not revoke its license yesterday, McGarvey said.
“Since the board saw substantial progress, but they still didn’t feel they were in compliance, they decided to continue the fine — $2,000 a day — and put out a couple of benchmarks,” he said.
Those included a March 31 deadline for financial documents and an April 26 cutoff for architectural renderings, as well as a construction timeline before meeting with the board again three days later, McGarvey said.
Residents and Casino Free Philadelphia members boarded a bus to Harrisburg at 7:15 a.m. yesterday to make sure their thoughts were heard loud and clear — just as they did a year earlier.
And the group was heard this time around, showing that Philadelphia does not want gaming in its environment.
“This is a much different place,” he said in comparison to Las Vegas and China. “I think the anti-casino movement in Philadelphia is second to none.”
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