Revere, a city five miles away from downtown Boston, has recently filed a lawsuit against the Massachusetts Gaming Commission. The reason for the lawsuit is the loss that its casino Mohegan Sun has suffered against Wynn Resorts. The two companies bet for the chance to receive casino license for an area in Boston. The accusations that Revere made were that the Gaming Commission violated state regulations when it pronounced Wynn Resorts’ offer as the winner to build a casino.
Revere claimed that the Gaming Commission has unlawfully set Wynn Resorts as the favorite choice during the application stage, and further claimed that the members of the commission have attended meetings in secret during the breaks of the official meetings. There they further discussed the applicant’s projects, something that stands against the Open Meeting Law of the State of Massachusetts.
The lawsuit consisted of forty-nine pages and was created by the authorities of Revere together with the IBEW local representatives. IBEW is the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers. The local electrical workers stood against the Wynn Resorts’ win because most of them have lost their jobs when the local offer was not approved, and therefore, local Suffolk Downs had to close down. If the local offer had won, the casino would have been built near the track and would have invigorated the area and potentially created new jobs.
Boston Globe commented that the strangest thing was that the commission was aware that by approving Wynn’s project, the local Suffolk Downs would have no other choice but to close, leaving many without jobs. The locals found it distressing that the commission did not consider this factor as a minus for the Wynn offer.
The claim of Revere further points out other problems, which the Wynn Resort plan imposes. For example, the land where the casino is to be built – Everett land, has a convicted felon as part of the owners. Three men were claimed to be hiding this detail from the commission.
The mayor of Revere commented there are many distressing issues raised by the decisions of the gaming commission, creating doubts in its objectivity and legitimacy in granting a state gambling license. He listed all the cons of the Wynn proposal, such as the inability to ask for correct community mitigation, the concealment of “potential criminal activity” going at the Everett as well as lack of objectivity during the process of the auction.
On the other hand, Mr. Shafran, a spokesperson for the Massachusetts Gambling Commission, stated that the city is simply ditraught that it did not win the license. He said that the city has turned this bitterness into false claims, as well as legal actions accusing the commission for biased decision making. He ended his statement by assuring the community that the process of choosing a winner for the casino license was thorough and open to the public. It was based on an objective analysis of the two offers.
