MA Question 1: Slots Parlor Proposal Creates Rift in Revere

REVERE, MA — The ballot push to double Massachusetts' number of slots parlor licenses from one to two breaks into clear camps:

Question 1 is an economic no-brainer.

Question 1 is about predacious greed.

At least, that's what the two groups pushing each agenda would have voters believe.

It's a knotty issue that could easily be minimized or buried. After all, why should your average voter in Worcester or Dedham care about a bill whose impact seems destined mainly for Revere? It also falls far down the ballot beneath polarizing presidential candidates and alongside better funded and, frankly, far sexier ballot pushes, including lifting the cap on charter schools and legalizing recreational marijuana in Massachusetts.

Behind the rhetoric, which a half-million dollars of funding and counting ensures will escalate as Nov. 8 draws close, are the people caught in the crossfire.

This is the first in a four-part, biweekly series on Massachusetts' November 2016 ballot initiatives. Through these articles, Patch hopes to shed light on voters' choices through the eyes of the people the outcomes would impact. Please email alison.bauter@patch.com with comments and questions.

Donna Mahoney is a lifelong Revere resident who speaks about her town with a level of pride she usually reserves for her 18-month-old grandson.

"The City of Revere is a gem, as far as I'm concerned," she said, invoking her parents' stories of a people-packed Revere Beach — the glory days of The Cyclone and the birth of Kelly's Roast Beef.

Those days are long gone at the sprawling, sandy shore that is notable today for the conspicuous absence of large-scale, ocean-front development.

Mahoney sees in the beach a parallel for a city she says has seen plenty of small businesses come and go, but none of what she calls "real, good business," the kind that sticks around, provides support for the city, offers year-round job opportunities.

She thought a previous casino pitched for Suffolk Downs could be that answer. That bid failed, but Mahoney now sees potential in another prospect: what's been reported as a 500- to 600-room hotel and slot machine parlor, proposed by a little-known real estate developer and, by all appearances, slated for a stretch of land near the Suffolk Downs horse track.

Eugene McCain, a real estate developer who lives in Revere, is the person who petitioned to put Question 1 on the ballot, whose committee paid a company to collect the signatures to put it there, and who's reportedly hoping to buy that tract of land near the track, currently occupied by a trailer park.

“This (ballot) initiative is not only designed to safeguard thousands of jobs at tracks and farms across the Commonwealth but to also bring in new economic activity to local communities and the state,” he wrote in a previous email to The Boston Globe. “Thoroughbred races have a long and storied history here in Massachusetts — one that began with the opening of Suffolk Downs in East Boston in 1935.”

McCain declined to comment directly for this story, but a spokesman for his Yes on 1 Committee told Patch they anticipate between 300 and 400 "good-paying jobs with benefits" would come from a successful new slots parlor. That's in addition to tax revenue available under the local host agreement, as well as the tax return to the state itself, he said.

After advocating for the ballot initiative among her neighbors and friends, Mahoney said she recently signed on with the Yes on 1 committee, working for them part-time to push the state into adding a second slots parlor license.

She sees in it a chance "at economic growth, a future." She can't understand why anyone wouldn't want that.

Mahoney is the kind of constituent Revere Mayor Brian Arrigo desperately wants to reach.

Arrigo is nine months into his mayoral tenure, and serves as de facto figurehead for the opposition to Question 1.

He, too, wants the kind of "real, good business" Mahoney describes — he just doesn't think McCain's proposal fits the definition.

Arrigo sees no evidence of a track-record from McCain, and he describes the developer's proposal to the city as short and "riddled with errors." It's not the gambling element of it, the mayor said, but the way McCain has gone about it by seeking state approval for a second slots parlor without getting the local blessing first.

"They've gone about this in a way and used a process that is—I'll use a nice word—'unique,'" Arrigo said.

He also uses not-so-nice words for McCain and his group: "shadowy," "a little predatory," "a lazy, fly-by-night group of people who want to drop a slots parlor in Revere," a group "trying to stuff something down the city's throat."

Arrigo envisions attracting a development that offers better-paying jobs, he said, something that measures up to the $1.3 billion Mohegan Sun development he supported as a city councilor. He thinks accepting a proposal he sees as shoddy and shady would set a bad precedent, and deter future developers.

When speaking to skeptical constituents, he puts it this way: "It's about higher standards."

Arrigo's vision echoes Mahoney's. He, too, sees vast potential in real estate along the Blue Line and Revere Beach. He wants "a good development that's going to create real jobs," attracting something like an office park or, some day, a corporate headquarters. It admittedly can sound "pie in the sky," he said, but the city is laying the groundwork.

However, that leaves Arrigo advocating against proposed development without a concrete alternative to offer in its place. And it isn't just his local constituents he has to convince.

Question 1, as it will appear on November's ballot, states:

"A YES VOTE would permit the state Gaming Commission to license one additional slot-machine gaming establishment at a location that meets certain conditions specified in the law."

A voters' guide issued this week by the state offers arguments from both camps.

There's McCain, who writes that a "yes" vote could bring the state millions in revenue, thousands of jobs and help sustain Massachusetts' horse-racing industry. Then there's Celeste Ribeiro Myers, who chairs the anti-Question 1 committee and previously led the fight against the Suffolk Downs casino. She argues, among other things, that the state's casino market is already on track for over-saturation, and that the ballot question is "written by one casino developer, for one reason: his own financial gain."

Nowhere in that statewide ballot question is Revere mentioned, despite the fact that McCain is angling to buy land there and that the ballot question's language offers only a few viable locations.

"It's unfortunate that the entire Commonwealth will get to vote on something that could impact the City of Revere far into the future," Arrigo said.

He hopes voters can understand why he, and nearly every other local leader, has come out against Question 1. He hopes they'll "follow the money" as ads ramp up in favor of the proposal.

The Breakdown: Here's How Much Massachusetts' Ballot Questions Cost

The only group registered in opposition to Question 1, Ribeiro Myers' Committee for Sustainable and Responsible Economic Development, has raised about $35,000, according to the most recent state filings.

The pro-Question 1 Horse Racing Jobs and Education Committee, founded and largely funded by McCain, has raised just over $3 million, initially spent mostly on signature-gathering and office space in Revere. A consultant with McCain's group told The Boston Globe they plan to spend millions of dollars on TV and radio advertising in the coming weeks.

That ad push will center around the state's existing slots parlor, the Plainridge Park Casino, in Plainville, and "the $88 million in taxes it has paid since opening in June 2015."

"A parlor in Revere would probably do at least as well," the consultant told The Globe.

It's messaging Ribeiro Myers and her group would strongly dispute. In her write-up in the state's election guide, Ribeiro Myers describes the Plainville slots parlor as "unsuccessful."

When asked for comment, she directed Patch to Les Bernal, the Massachusetts native behind Stop Predatory Gambling, a national group that seeks to dismantle what Bernal believes are damaging narratives fueling the rise of casinos around the country.

When pushed, he said, casino developers will talk about anything else — the jobs, the hotel — but not about how they themselves profit. That's because it comes down to a raw deal for taxpayers, he said, redistributing wealth from gamblers back to the state, which itself promotes betting in an effort to fill its coffers with the tax revenue. Moreover, Bernal says, evidence shows states who rely on gambling revenue are struggling.

"It's the ultimate scam; it's the big con," he said. "If people knew, this (ballot initiative) would never pass."

Read More: All Four Massachusetts Ballot Questions for November 2016

Nonetheless, there's evidence Massachusetts has acclimated to the practice.

A gambling-related question last landed on a statewide ballot in 2014, when Question 3 asked voters to repeal the 2011 law allowing resort casinos to operate in Massachusetts. It was soundly defeated.

Stonehill College Professor Peter Ubertaccio, who has been tracking Question 1, as well as the other ballot initiatives, takes this as a signal that gambling "is not the visceral issue it once was."

Mahoney reflects that perspective. There are bigger issues in Revere and in the state, such as jobs and economic development, she said. For her, the slots portion of McCain's proposal is an afterthought.

"I understand there would be a slots parlor downstairs," she said, sounding almost as if she hadn't considered the concept. "But it's not anything I see a concern about; I focus on the positives."

Between evidence of gambling's general acceptance and the precedent set by the existing slots parlor at Plainville, Ubertaccio said it stands to reason that Question 1 will prevail.

"It would really surprise me if it fails," he said.

Bernal, of Stop Predatory Gambling, believes the developer, McCain, is betting that voters won't dig too deeply into the economic and personal repercussions of casinos his group warns against.

"This guy's hoping to ride the coattails of the presidential election turnout," he said. "It's a half-million-dollar roll of the dice."

A WBUR poll conducted in early September suggests it's a less than done deal. About 52 percent of those polled across the state said they opposed Question 1, while only 37 percent supported a second slots parlor. More recently polling forecasts equally dire results for the "Yes on 1" campaign.

Even if it does pass, licensing will be up to the state's Gaming Commission. It will also come down to the will of the community where the slots parlor location is proposed.

In 2014, Revere voted "yes" in a referendum that threw local support behind Mohegan Sun’s ill-fated proposal to build a $1.3 billion gambling resort at Suffolk Downs. In an Oct. 18 special election, Revere decisively voted to oppose a local proposal seen as a referendum on the statewide ballot question.

Top photo by Alison Bauter, Patch staff

This story has been edited to reflect the fact that McCain lives and votes in Revere, according to a Yes on 1 spokesperson. A previous version of this article cited a report stating McCain is based in Thailand. He has had development projects is Thailand, but he is no longer based there, according to Yes on 1.