Armando Codina Op Ed in Miami Herald
GAMBLING
Proposed gaming bill would have negative impact
BY ARMANDO CODINA
ARMANDOCODINAPARTNERS@GMAIL.COM
Gaming provokes strong feelings and disagreement, even among friends and people of good will. Jack Lowell, my longtime business associate and someone I hold in high regard, recently wrote an Other Views piece favoring destination casinos in Miami.
I have been involved twice before in efforts opposing casinos. In 1986, I chaired the successful No Casinos effort. In 2005, I was involved in the fight against slot machines at parimutuels. We defeated the slot effort Read more
Norman Braman’s letter to the Miami Herald / November 15, 2011
Check Out This Biased Report by WPLG
Coalition Building – Faith Based Groups Join Forces
Published on Sunshine State News (http://www.sunshinestatenews.com)
Faith-Based Leaders Launch Effort to Oppose Casinos in Florida
Kevin Derby Posted: November 1, 2011 1:35 PM
Supporters of expanded gambling and casino operations in Florida can expect a fight in 2012.
That was the message from leaders of faith-based and anti-casino groups who held a media event in Tallahassee on Tuesday to announce their opposition to a bill backed by Sen. Ellyn Bogdnoff, R-Fort Lauderdale, and Rep. Erik Fresen, R-Miami, that would open the door to large casinos being set up in the Sunshine State.
Conservative leader John Stemberger from Florida Family Action drew a line in the sand and promised to fight any attempts to expand Read more
Senate Bill Sponsor Questions Genting Casino Pitch
Posted on Wednesday, 11.16.11
Gambling
Genting’s spectacular promises raise legislative doubts
The Senate sponsor of the resort casino bill slaps down the Malaysian-based company with a warning to tone its rhetoric down at the first legislative workshop of the resort casinos bill.
BY MARY ELLEN KLAS AND DOUGLAS HANKS
HERALD/TIMES TALLAHASSEE BUREAU
TALLAHASSEE — In the debut debate over the resort casinos bill Wednesday Read more
Another Anti-Casino Group Surfaces – from MIami Today
Just in time, an old name surfaces to lead anti-casino battle
By Michael Lewis
“How do I…” my friend started to ask.
I knew what was coming. I’ve heard it over and over, every day.
But I didn’t have an answer — until now.
The question: “How do I help stop casinos?”
Only three backers I’ve met aren’t on casino payrolls. But the silent majority who fear casinos had no rallying point — until now. Stick around and I’ll give you one.
We need a rally to halt a casino blitzkrieg. The Associated Press cites more than 100 registered lobbyists toiling in Tallahassee to ram through full-scale casinos at five pari-mutuel sites and add three massive casinos.
Make no mistake: we can stop a casino machine handing out big Read more
Gambling Bill: What’s in it? What’s not ?
From http://nocasinos.org/whats-in-the-bill/
The Gambling Bill: What’s in it (and what’s not)?
- Another empty promise. Despite the promises of casino promoters, the Fresen-Bogdanoff bill does not confine expanded gambling to Dade and Broward counties.
- Just three casinos? Don’t bet on it. A one-word amendment to the bill—even during any future legislative session—could cause the number of authorized casinos to balloon from three to five, to fifty, or more. How long before Tallahassee politicians decide that “just a few more” casinos couldn’t hurt?
- No referendum required—or desired. The bill does not require a referendum in Dade or Broward—relying instead on the slots referenda as proof of public approval. That is like saying if a neighborhood approves of a 7-11 at the corner then it’s safe to assume they will support putting the Mall of the Americas at the end of their street, too.
- Selling out on the cheap. The bill would hand casinos a 10 percent tax rate and a one-time license fee of up to $50 million, a figure that insiders say is embarrassingly low. It’s one thing to sell out Florida’s image and the world’s most enviable tourism economy. It’s quite another to sell it so cheaply.
- It won’t cover costs. Each casino is to set aside a paltry $250,000 per year to treat the inevitable social costs associated with compulsive gambling. It’s a tiny figure that won’t even begin to address the long-term, systemic social costs of expanded casino gambling.
- Operations? Expect the new casinos to operate 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year. Amazingly, the bill would also preempt local laws as it relates to the sale of alcohol.
- Sets up an unprecedented soft money machine. Members of the gaming commission are chosen by a process whereby the Senate President and the House Speaker nominate a pool of candidates from which the Governor chooses. If this is not a recipe for establishing that gambling interests become the primary funding mechanism for legislative leadership committees and gubernatorial races, than nothing is. Anybody concerned about honesty and integrity in government should be gravely concerned about this process. The gambling interests will have a soft money machine in place that makes anything we’ve seen heretofore look like a teenager’s allowance.
Read the full texts below:
House Bill 487 | Representative Erik Fresen, R-Miami
Senate Bill 710 | Senator Ellyn Bogdanoff, R-Fort Lauderdale
Replacement for Fresen Bill? Seminoles May Pay More
Gambling debate
Bill would replace resort casinos with more money from Seminoles
A Palm Beach Democrat suggests having the governor re-negotiate the state’s agreement with the Seminole Tribe to demand higher payments and reject resort casinos
BY MARY ELLEN KLAS
HERALD/TIMES TALLAHASSEE BUREAU
TALLAHASSEE – In an attempt to shift the debate from Miami casinos to the state’s bottom line, state Rep. Joe Abruzzo is filing a bill Wednesday to direct Gov. Rick Scott to give the Seminole Tribe exclusive operation of casino games in Florida for 15 more years in exchange for an annual guarantee of $750 million.
The four-page bill would authorize the governor to re-open the 20-year gambling compact signed in 2009 by Gov. Charlie Crist that now requires the Seminole Tribe of Florida to guarantee $1 billion in the first five years in exchange for the exclusive right to offer table games in Miami Dade and Broward and slot machines outside of South Florida. The tribe now pays an average of $150 million a year under the agreement.
Abruzzo said that his proposal essentially Read more
Write State Legislators Before Wednesday Nov 16 Committee Meeting
Please write these legislators before Wednesday to kill the New Resorts Casinos Bill, the Frsen/Bogdanoff Bill. Contact Them Through our Contact Officials tab
REGULATED INDUSTRIES Senator Jones, Chair
Senator Sachs, Vice Chair
MEETING DATE: Wednesday, November 16, 2011 TIME: 8:30 —11:30 a.m.
PLACE: Toni Jennings Committee Room, 110 Senate Office Building
MEMBERS: Senator Jones, Chair; Senator Sachs, Vice Chair; Senators Altman, Bogdanoff, Braynon, Dean, Diaz
Is Common Sense in Miami Possible?
By Gregory Bush, Vice President, Urban Environment League
publicbush@gmail.com
Tom Paine published Common Sense in 1776 as a down to earth treatise against British authority in North America. It was a critical pamphlet in rousing support against the British and the coming of the American Revolutionary war. We now need many people to speak out against Destination Casino gambling’s attempt to take over Miami – an area not even part of the United States until the early nineteenth century . We need to use this threat to help redefine our region in a more human scale – moving away from the hype in showing that this is a destination that is well planned, beautiful, thinks about the long term, and contains people who are not filled with resentment at having lost the main chance. We should not gamble our future on “something for nothing,” the title of a book on gambling in American history by Jackson Lears. Make no mistake about it. Destination resort gambling will be a new form of tyranny.
Many thoughtful observers believe that we need more Common Sense in planning the future of Miami and MIami-Dade County (and Broward as well) without gargantuan casinos that warp our resources and degrade our downtown – when it is just starting to recover. Yet such people need to speak out more through blogs, letters to editors and their local and state representatives.
Great financial power can corrupt as we have recently learned in this nation – and bowing to further expressions of gambling power within South Florida would further degrade our politics and exploit our hope for a broad scale recovery from this recession – a recovery that will hopefully benefit far more people than before. Do we want to stimulate productive labor and healthy tourism or what such large scale gambling will bring? Politicians seem to be falling all over themselves to get their piece of the gambling pie. What a sad spectacle. We need more attention by politicians to create good jobs in our area, attract a broad spectrum of business, and build compelling landscapes for all our people – not defer to the NEXT BIG IDEA as a panacea for Miami – which is a sad but recurring feature of the city’s history.
Resort casino gambling will feed the pockets of the owners but warp the priorities of government and the people who live here and who care about the place. Miami is far from perfect. Crime exists here now – but wait and see what the future could bring if the Fresen/Bogdanoff bill becomes law.
Sadly, many people think that the fix is on to bring large scale Las Vegas like gambling to Miami. The gambling interests have hired an astonishing array of lawyers, lobbyists, PR people and other allies in their attempt to fuel the steamroller. That is the way politics is done in this area. Big money all to often seems to rule. Yet that is not what happened when the Marlins tried to take Bicentennial Park for a new Marlins Stadium or when Virginia Key Beach was slated to go away as a public park and become an upscale Eco Resort. People and groups have awakened- periodically in recent Miami history – to call for better focus on the overall quality of life here in South Florida rather than simple deference to what is perceived to be a financial steamroller. That culture of cynicism needs to be forcefully confronted – but with positive alternatives. That is the challenge in the coming months for all of us in my view. Speak out against the Fresen/Bogdanoff Bill and start addressing the broad scope of serious needs of all our people.
Norman Braman on Gambling
