Sore Losers!

Neither Suffolk Downs' Chip Tuttle, nor Mohegan Sun offered comments or congratulations to the great activists that defeated them!

Let's REPEAL THE CASINO DEAL and be done with them!

 

 

 

 

 

 

The ballot box failure leaves the future of New England’s last thoroughbred racetrack in grave doubt. The 78-year-old track has been losing money for years, as its owners have pumped in cash to keep Suffolk Downs afloat in anticipation of adding a profitable casino.

“Voters . . . struck a decisive blow to the casino culture, a clear signal that the Commonwealth believes there are better economic options than casinos and slot barns,” John Ribeiro, chairman of the Repeal the Casino Deal campaign, said in a statement Tuesday night.

Celeste Myers, a leader of the Suffolk Downs opposition group, No Eastie Casino, said she was not expecting such a resounding victory. “This is East Boston — folks are protecting their lives, livelihoods and homes,” she said in an interview. “These people can’t be bought.”

Myers said the group will oppose any 11th-hour effort to try to move the project. Public officials, she said, “need to take no for an answer.”

http://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2013/11/05/suffolk-downs-defeated-boston-will-explore-revere-only-project/o2VK5haGBzosrwvu7mTLiI/story.html?s_campaign=email_BG_TodaysHeadline

Congratulations East Boston!

Steve Holt

New York Times (you DO realize this is national news, RIGHT?) on East Boston's HUGE win tonight:

"In Massachusetts, voters on Tuesday rejected a proposal that sought to bring a gleaming $1 billion resort casino to the fading Suffolk Downs racetrack in East Boston, according to The A.P. After a heated campaign that pitted the promise of thousands of jobs and millions of dollars in new investments against worries about crime and gambling addiction, voters in East Boston and the adjacent town of Revere voted against a dramatic new addition to their neighborhoods.

The vote was a victory for the opposition group No Eastie Casino, which ran a shoestring campaign and was vastly outspent by proponents. Many small-business owners in East Boston believed the casino would siphon off whatever discretionary money people had, and No Eastie Casino asserted that gambling would snarl traffic and increase drug use and crime.

Supporters of the casino, including Mayor Thomas M. Menino of Boston, who sent his troops into the area on Election Day to pull out “yes” votes, said that it would bring the communities 4,000 jobs and an infusion of money for things like new roads.

Even before Tuesday, the fate of the Massachusetts measure had been thrown into doubt when the state gambling commission raised questions last month about the suitability of Suffolk Downs’s partner at the time, Caesars Entertainment, to operate the casino. Suffolk asked Caesars to withdraw from the bid, which it did.

Chip Tuttle, the chief operating officer of Suffolk Downs, told reporters that he was not certain how the track would proceed, but the apparently lopsided vote against the casino could well have doomed the effort."

Colorado Rejects Move for Schools as Casino Fails in Massachusetts

Matthew Staver for The New York Times

Madeline Doak, 18, a student election judge, collected ballots in Denver. Taxes and marijuana were up for statewide votes.

By JACK HEALY

Published: November 5, 2013

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/11/06/us/politics/key-ballot-measures.html?_r=1&