Chinese Investors Could Score Green Cards in Return for Investing in Arundel Mills Casino

In an effort to increase funding for its Maryland Live! project at Arundel Mills, the Cordish Co. is seeking Chinese investors and luring them with the promise of a green card in exchange for an investment of $500,000, according to a report from the Washington Post.

The article reveals that developers are using more than just financial profit to get foreign investors interested in the project.

"On the first Saturday in September, about 50 well-off Chinese crowded into a fourth-floor conference room in a high-rise on fashionable Nanjing Road to listen in hushed silence to an unusual sales pitch. For a mere $500,000 investment, they were told, the participants could receive a coveted American green card to allow them and their family members to live in the United States," the Washington Post reports. 

The international program that allows foreign investors to earn green cards has been in existence for decades and is contingent upon the investor creating at least 10 jobs with their investment, according to the article. 

In addition to the recent report, the casino's construction has received its share of hiccups and media attention. Back in April, because they said Reliable Contracting, a company working on the construction project, was failing to meet union-standard wages and hire local laborers. 

In early July, , sending him to the hospital. Later in the month, another serious accident occurred,  after a 25-ton slab of concrete fell on the two men. 

Despite the accidents, the Cordish Company expects to complete construction in June of 2012.