{"id":15335,"date":"2015-01-14T13:00:42","date_gmt":"2015-01-14T21:00:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/?p=15335"},"modified":"2015-01-14T13:00:42","modified_gmt":"2015-01-14T21:00:42","slug":"cuomos-new-york-mess-thickens","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/cuomos-new-york-mess-thickens\/","title":{"rendered":"Cuomo’s New York mess thickens"},"content":{"rendered":"

Bowing to pressure from New York State<\/strong> Gov. Andrew Cuomo<\/strong> (D), the\u00a0Gaming Facility Location Board<\/strong> is starting the clock on a new round of bidding<\/a> for casinos in the \"Seal_of_New_York.svg\"<\/a>state’s thinly populated Southern Tier. It didn’t draw much interest last time. Only Tioga Downs<\/strong> and Traditions at the Glen Resort<\/strong> (which has withdrawn from consideraton) stepped up to the plate. Ergo, the Location Board decided to withhold the fourth of four gaming concessions.<\/p>\n

“Governor Cuomo initially supported the decision, saying that a casino was not likely to spur economic development in the relatively sparsely populated area near Binghamton<\/strong>. But after hearing criticism from elected officials and local residents, Mr. Cuomo asked the board to consider a new round of bidding for a casino license specifically for the Southern Tier,” reports the New York Times<\/em>. Not a very resolute fellow, this Cuomo.<\/p>\n

Location Board Chairman Kevin Law<\/strong> warned that whatever crosses the transom in this second round of bidding had better be superior to what the state was offered the first time<\/a>. \"Nevele<\/a>(Even Tioga Downs<\/strong> owner Jeff Gural<\/strong> agrees with that, having only contemplated $102 million in improvements in his initial do-it-on-the-quick bid.) And if they’re not, the Location Board still has the discretion of withholding a site award. Law is also standing by the board’s award of concessions to projects in Schenectady<\/strong>, Monticello<\/strong> and Tyre<\/strong>. However, Newburgh<\/strong> Mayor Judy Kennedy<\/strong> wants in on that third license, as do backers of a proposed Nevele<\/strong> resort-casino (above<\/em>). They say they now may have the backing of James Packer<\/strong>‘s RatPac Entertainment. Cuomo has really kicked over a hornet’s nest of problems by second-guessing the Location Board’s work.<\/p>\n

* Can a high-tech computer company succeed without an American presence? It certainly can if it’s Luke Alvarez<\/strong>‘s Inspired Gaming Group<\/strong>. Founded in 2001, it has grown not only in its own United Kingdom<\/strong> (where 65% of adults gamble), where it supplies nearly 17,000 fixed-odds terminals for betting shops<\/a>. Inspired boasts that its products can be found in 40,000 locations and on 200 mobile sites worldwide, and it counts William Hill<\/strong> and Paddy Power<\/strong> amongst its clients. In Italy<\/strong>, Inspired commands 90% of the online and terrestrial sports-betting market but its biggest coup to date has to be a pact to supply its electronic sports games to China<\/strong>‘s national lottery. (Next stop: the Philippines<\/strong>.)<\/p>\n

Given the economic instability, governments need to raise taxes from as many sources as possible,\u201d Alvarez says, explaining his company’s growth. Since sports betting is Inspired’s bread-and-butter product line, we probably shouldn’t look for them on U.S. shores — or in American cyberspace — anytime soon.<\/p>\n

* We Las Vegans thought we’d hit the jackpot when we drew an estimated 40 million visitors last year but revised calculations put the count above 41 million<\/a> and the Las Vegas Convention Visitors Authority<\/strong> hopes to draw an additional half-million next year.\u00a0Alaska \"Strip\"<\/a>Airlines<\/strong>, Allegiant Air<\/strong>, Frontier Airlines<\/strong>, JetBlue<\/strong>, Spirit Airlines<\/strong>, Virgin America<\/strong> and Southwest Airlines<\/strong> have all announced increases in air capacity and a sunny economic forecast is expected to further boost tourism.<\/p>\n

Hotel-casinos were quick to capitalize on last year’s bonanza, with revenue per available room up 8%. The LVCVA is also projecting a big infusion of hotel rooms in 2017 … provided that Genting Group<\/strong> gets cracking on Resorts World Las Vegas<\/strong>. (Now with 100% less activity than last year!) For two years now, though, Las Vegas<\/strong> has been the fastest-growing international destination, more than making up for a sated domestic market.<\/p>\n

Canada<\/strong> and Mexico<\/strong> are the primary drivers of the additional visitation — so local mugwumps should stop demonizing the Mexicans who are helping keep the lights on in Vegas. (Zurich<\/strong> also turned out to be an unexpected pipeline of Vegas-bound tourists; ditto South Koreans coming by way of Cancun<\/strong>.)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Bowing to pressure from New York State Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D), the\u00a0Gaming Facility Location Board is starting the clock on a new round of bidding for casinos in the state’s thinly populated Southern Tier. It didn’t draw much interest last … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[14,22,96,75,101,192,25,187,74,8,9,100],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15335"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15335"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15335\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15338,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15335\/revisions\/15338"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15335"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15335"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15335"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}