Quite a lot apparently, if you’re Wynn Boston and you’re going up against local favorite Mohegan Sun. A poll taken by the Center for 
Policy Analysis at the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth found voters split between 48% in favor of Mohegan Sun vs. only 27% for Wynn. Casino expert Clyde Barrow attributed the outcome to Mohegan Sun’s standing as “known commodity in New England that is visited annually by hundreds of thousands of Massachusetts residents.” Of course they won’t go to the original Mohegan Sun if an offshoot springs up in Revere, but that’s a problem the Mohegan Tribal Gaming Authority brought upon itself. But if the Massachusetts Gaming Commission rules in favor of Wynn, will voters sour on casinos per se?
The same poll found Boston-area voters opposing casino repeal 46% to 41%, but with a big, 13% pool of undecideds out there. Is having the casino you didn’t want better than no casino at all? This remains to be seen. (Repeal is much less popular among women than men, it seems.) Bay State legislators chose to shoot dice with the state budget, banking on $73 million in very theoretical casino revenue (in a budget which overshoots revenue growth). One feels like a Grinch for saying this while reading lines like, “Several Senate priorities were included in the spending plan including substance abuse prevention, education, local aid, mental health services, veterans, public safety and child welfare,” but it’s true.**
(** “On the policy front, the budget would for the first time allow for direct shipments of up to 12 cases of wine a year from out-of-state vineyards to Massachusetts wine drinkers.”)
Meanwhile, Ron Chimelis editorializes eloquently on behalf of a Springfield casino. As he notes, “Springfield’s future is largely in the hands of people who live east of Worcester. That is an unsettling thought.”
Saturated yet? According to Moody’s Investor Service, most regional U.S. casino markets are looking at a decline of as much as 5% over the next year and a half and up to -7.5% in cash flow. This reverses a cautiously optimistic Moody’s report from earlier. Colorado, Delaware, New Jersey, Illinois, Kansas, Indiana, Iowa, Michigan, Louisiana, New York, Missouri and Pennsylvania were among the states scrutinized. Indiana and Connecticut got hammered particularly badly. Maryland and Ohio defied the downward trend, in large part because they have so much new gambling product coming online (racinos in Ohio, table games in Maryland). One other bright spot? The Las Vegas Strip, recording gains of 10.5% in March and 3% in April.
