Bowing to the inevitable, the Massachusetts Gaming Commission ratified MGM Resorts International‘s redesign of MGM Springfield, on which the casino company is already hard at work. What was the MGC to do? Tell MGM to go back to Square One? 
The casino company held all the cards and everybody knew it. “Seeing this again, it reminds me why we’re really excited about it,” said MGC Chairman Stephen Crosby, although we can’t second the emotion, given the distinct lack of “wow” factor in the revised designs. (Elimination of the hotel tower really hurt.) “You can have luxury that’s not necessarily in a high-rise tower,” project President Michael Mathis argued. If the purpose of the new look is to be fairly unobtrusive, MGM has succeeded with flying colors. Indeed, MGM is selling the redesign as a means of maintaining downtown Springfield‘s historical aura.
Paradoxically, MGM is characterizing the revision as a cost-saving measure at the same time that the budget has swollen to $950 million. However, I doubt that many people in Springfield think that there’s any such thing as MGM investing too much money in their city. Indeed, Mathis has as much as promised $50 million a year in new business for local vendors. One thing he can’t offer is more than a token amount of free parking: 700 of the parking spaces will be available on a paid basis. Moralists will cluck their tongues at the relocation of the First Spiritualist Church to make way for that parking garage — portal to sinful gambling, oh my!
MGM Springfield General Counsel Seth Stratton got off the best bon mot of the hearing, when he said, “It was a mild winter, but Mike and I were fortunate to miss most of the bad weather because we spent most of it in the Springfield City Council chambers.” Zing!
No word on whether you’ll have to pay for parking at Wynn Boston Harbor but, with a planned 2,930 underground spaces, we think Steve Wynn can be “george” and comp it. Wynn Resorts is also planning to restore the Mystic River shoreline and service the 
casino via high-speed catamarans (shades of Macao) … if meddlesome politicians will let it. Somerville Mayor Joseph Curtatone continues to oppose the environmental permit granted the casino and has Attorney General Maura Healey in his corner. “For 30 years, they fought about the contamination. In four months, we cleaned it up,” said Wynn Design & Development Massachusetts President Christopher Gordon. Indeed, a toxic brownfield could be redeveloped into remunerative real estate if the Boston political establishment would get out of the way. A good thing that Steve Wynn is persistent and has an enviable track record when it comes to fighting City Hall.
The Mohegan Sun terrier also continues to nip at Wynn’s ankles. In an effort to turn back the clock, it is asking the Supreme Judicial Court to keep alive its lawsuit to overturn the MGC’s casino award to Wynn. In its defense, the MGC points to language that bars applicants from “any further review if denied by the commission.” “What if the Legislature starts inserting that language into other types of omnibus regulatory bills,” asked one legal analyst. ““We’re talking gaming right now … What if we’re talking any other type of business regulation?”
Mohegan Sun wants Wynn Resorts stripped of its casino license and for the entire process to be rebid from the starting gate. “It’s the longest of long shots. I’ll be quite honest. This looks like they’re sore losers,” Boston College casino expert Richard McGowan told the 
Boston Globe. The Mohegans, for their part, argue that the MGC coached Wynn through the application process and lent insufficient weight to the company’s purchase of land co-owned by convicted felon Charles Lightbody. It also accuses an MGC staffer of proposing a “cure” that would get Wynn around the Lightbody problem. Steve Wynn didn’t bother to address the Mohegan Sun issue on his most recent earnings call but Wynn Boston Harbor President Robert DeSalvio was less reticent, terming the effort a “desperate, self-serving attempt to delay our resort and protect, by its own account, $20 million a month they will lose when Wynn Boston Harbor opens.” If Mohegan Sun prevails, it would be one of the most deplorable setbacks in recent casino history.
* In a surprising development, Michigan could become the fourth state to legalize 
Internet poker. At least that’s what prime mover state Sen. Mike Kowall (right) believes. “I don’t see why it wouldn’t go through this year,” said his chief of state and, indeed, the state has until December to ponder the issue. The estimate that i-poker will generate 22,000 sounds like pie in the sky, though (better call New Jersey for a reality check). However, the bill have the virtue of cutting tribal casinos in on the action, ameliorating their displeasure with being left out of Michigan’s online lottery.
* It’s not often that a casino operator gets run clear out of town but that happened in Tinian, out the middle of the Pacific Ocean. Casino company Hong Kong Entertainment lost its license to run the Tinian Dynasty Hotel & Casino in a unanimous vote. HKE had been co-mingling casino revenues with other funds, prohibited by law, had staffers in sensitive positions who hadn’t been vetted to work in the casino and failed to comply with audit requirements for seven years. Said Mayor Joey San Nicolas, “we have not generated any casino revenues and this has had a substantial impact on our ability to deliver programs and services.” Added another city official, “the requirement for separate and local bank accounts helps to ensure among other matters the accuracy of the revenues reported by a casino operator and therefore the accuracy of the taxes levied on the casino and the casino’s compliance with laws and regulations such as the anti-money-laundering law.” With HKE gone, Tinian Dynasty is closed, though the city hopes for another operator soon.
