I guess Republicans are right...more taxes DO mean fewer jobs!

This I just don't get. Voters approved the casinos. Now with construction underway the state is changing the game? Keep in mind that I never was a big fan of the casino idea to begin with, but this seems dumb to me.

Kasich hasn't impressed me much from the getgo, but this pretty much closes the deal.

Casino construction suspended

Written by
Alexander Coolidge
acoolidge@enquirer.com

DOWNTOWN – Casino developer Rock Gaming and its partner Caesars Entertainment have suspended construction of both its gambling projects in Cincinnati and Cleveland, citing its dispute with Ohio officials who want to increase their taxes.

Last week, the Republican-led Ohio House of Representatives approved a proposed budget that includes a key tax rule that will mean a much larger bill for casinos under the state’s Commercial Activity Tax (CAT).


Casinos are also facing off against Republican Gov. John Kasich who has blasted the 2009 amendment that legalized casinos as a “raw deal” for Ohio and has hired consultants to explore his tax strategy and other gambling policies.

“Construction work on both sites has been suspended and will remain so until these issues have been resolved and a reliable state economic environment is in place,” Rock Gaming officials said in a statement on Wednesday.

“Only then can we proceed with construction and deliver on our commitment to employ thousands of Ohioans in new private sector construction and casino-related jobs, provide hundreds of millions of dollars annually to support local public schools and vital local government services, and generate much-needed investment in the urban cores of Cleveland and Cincinnati.”

Rock officials added they were “hopeful” they could resolve the dispute with Ohio officials quickly so work could resume.

The announcement idles thousands of construction jobs as Rock balks at taxes millions higher than initially envisioned. Specifically, the House’s budget seeks to apply the 0.26 percent CAT tax to total betting at Ohio’s four planned casinos rather than just net losses by gamblers, the industry’s standard definition of revenue. If Ohio enacted the proposal it would mean a CAT tax bill for all four casinos possibly 10 times higher than the $5.2 million developers envisioned.

Rock Gaming officials have become increasingly vocal in the last two months about Ohio officials’ considerations on how to get more taxes out of casinos. The developers say such musings have complicated financing both construction projects.

On Wednesday, Rock said the House vote as well as discussions of higher taxes “have created an environment of uncertainty concerning the projected economic vitality of our planned developments in both Cincinnati and Cleveland.”

Last month, Rock cancelled a key steel order that delayed the 2012 opening date of Cincinnati’s casino until early 2013.


http://news.cincinnati.com/article/20110...305110120/

If Kasich gets his way, OH would tax casinos at the 3rd highest rate in the nation.

On one hand, this is holding up progress that is needed.

On the other, maybe we did not learn our lesson about voting in something without knowing the specifics regarding $$, a la Paul Brown Stadium and Mikey Brown's sweetheart deal?

(05-11-2011 04:07 PM)bearcatfan Wrote:  On one hand, this is holding up progress that is needed.

On the other, maybe we did not learn our lesson about voting in something without knowing the specifics regarding $$, a la Paul Brown Stadium and Mikey Brown's sweetheart deal?

You make a good point about PBS. I voted for that. I don't like feeling stupid about decisions I've made, and that one made me feel stupid. Did we ever get taken for a ride with that stinker of a deal. If I ever saw Bob Bedinghaus in person, I'd give him a piece of my mind and tell him get the hell out of town.

But you'll need to refresh my memory. Were the actual terms of the agreement made with Mike Brown before or after the vote?

As a side note, along with the stadium deals was another vote on where to put the Reds stadium. Bob B. and the 4th Street business powers pooled their resources together to assure us that the Broadway Commons area was destined to be a big housing development.

Along with that were sympathy ads telling us the baseball at Broadway would force out all those poor people. Fast forward and those same bigwigs are now funnelling megamoney into OTR, creating cries of displacement from the neighborhood's poor while our governor is actively pursuing a policy that will most likely decrease the size of the casino which is so ironically being built at the Broadway Commons site.

It's all so funny and fascinating.

Not a huge Kasich guy, proof of how bad Strickland was.

But I couldn't care less how big a chunk the state tries to get. Get as much as you can now. Casino knows they'll be printing money. Only gang worse than unions are casino operators.

(05-11-2011 04:48 PM)rath v2.0 Wrote:  Not a huge Kasich guy, proof of how bad Strickland was.

But I couldn't care less how big a chunk the state tries to get. Get as much as you can now. Casino knows they'll be printing money. Only gang worse than unions are casino operators.

Or how about letting them build the casino, see what they're bringing in, how many people they employ, then adjust accordingly at that point in time?

I don't believe Strickland had anything to do with the casino ballot issue, correct?

Strickland tried to do an end-around voters with the slot machine measure he rammed down Ohio's throat. He hated the tax deduction element of the casino bill.

Issue 3 was privately pushed and funded - by the same guys crying that the state is asking for higher taxes...namely Penn National Gaming, LLC out of PA who spent 47.2 million of its own declared hard cash to get this through with millions funnelled through a PAC it set up as a straw man.

Strickland was against the Casinos, and Kasich is trying to tax them too much. They both are wrong.

(05-11-2011 04:07 PM)bearcatfan Wrote:  On one hand, this is holding up progress that is needed.

On the other, maybe we did not learn our lesson about voting in something without knowing the specifics regarding $$, a la Paul Brown Stadium and Mikey Brown's sweetheart deal?

PBS is 180 degrees different, the Casino is being built and operated by private money, not taxpayer (County sales tax increase) dough.

I have no sympathy for Casino Owners.

I don't know all the specifics. But I do know we are losing a lot of money out of state because we don't have casinos. It seems like Kasich is trying to play his hand aggressively since the casinos have already sunk a decent amount of money into the projects. Hopefully he doesn't overplay his hand.

He can't overplay his hand. He knows the same thing the casinos do. Even at the highest tax rate in the country, these 4 casinos will be making money hand over fist.

Indiana has spent 15 years trying to piecemeal revise the tax rate because they botched it and bent over when the dockside riverboats started opening in 1995 and 96. Everytime they try to go back the the drawing board, the casinos freak out, bog the works down with lobbyists and PR campaigns. They compromise and then the casinos laugh all the way to the bank (again). Their most recent revision was in 2007. They are looking at it again because they never took a big enough bite of the apple the first time around.

Quote:Before July 2002, the riverboat casinos paid a flat rate wagering tax equal to 20 percent of the casino win. This rate increased to 22.5 percent in July 2002. The dockside gaming regime, which all of the riverboat casinos switched to in August 2002, requires the casino owner to pay the wagering tax on a graduated rate schedule in lieu of the flat rate tax.

The current graduated rate schedule is specified in Figure 3.

Figure 3: Graduated Rate Schedule for Wagering Taxes, 2008



The rate schedule implemented in 2002 had five tax brackets and topped out at 35 percent of the annual win generated by a casino exceeding $150 million. The 40 percent tax bracket was added by 2007 legislation.

Don't weep for the casinos. They will fleece enough folks to make a king's ransom no matter the tax rate no matter what they say.

(05-12-2011 06:52 AM)rath v2.0 Wrote:  He can't overplay his hand. He knows the same thing the casinos do. Even at the highest tax rate in the country, these 4 casinos will be making money hand over fist.

Indiana has spent 15 years trying to piecemeal revise the tax rate because they botched it and bent over when the dockside riverboats started opening in 1995 and 96. Everytime they try to go back the the drawing board, the casinos freak out, bog the works down with lobbyists and PR campaigns. They compromise and then the casinos laugh all the way to the bank (again). Their most recent revision was in 2007. They are looking at it again because they never took a big enough bite of the apple the first time around.

Quote:Before July 2002, the riverboat casinos paid a flat rate wagering tax equal to 20 percent of the casino win. This rate increased to 22.5 percent in July 2002. The dockside gaming regime, which all of the riverboat casinos switched to in August 2002, requires the casino owner to pay the wagering tax on a graduated rate schedule in lieu of the flat rate tax.

The current graduated rate schedule is specified in Figure 3.

Figure 3: Graduated Rate Schedule for Wagering Taxes, 2008



The rate schedule implemented in 2002 had five tax brackets and topped out at 35 percent of the annual win generated by a casino exceeding $150 million. The 40 percent tax bracket was added by 2007 legislation.

Don't weep for the casinos. They will fleece enough folks to make a king's ransom no matter the tax rate no matter what they say.

The issue isn't if the casinos will make money or not. The issue will be whether the casinos make enough money. If the tax rate lowers their quarterly results, the casino will react accordingly by eliminating their underperformers.

I think it's funny that as one of the most conservative people on this board, you are complaining that Indiana hasn't taken a big enough tax bit from their casinos.

And I think its funny the biggest bleeding heart on the board is standing up for the casinos.

Casinos are not regular people or normal businesses. Its mostly a retro tax and a state sponsored license to fleece mostly from the segments of society that can least afford it. Go to the boats in Indiana...its not the bling bling rich and famous. Its mostly the blue collar and the old ladies blowing their SSDI checks.

I voted no. It passed after being voted down repeatedly only because of the millions paid by the casinos to bankroll the slick media blitz against an underfunded opposition. Since it passed, I want the state to grab as much of the pie as they can. Screw em'. They'll make plenty. Wait till the first year report comes out.

I can think of a stadium deal that i wished someone had taken a harder look at to negotiate better
terms before inking the project.

(05-12-2011 08:30 AM)Major ----de Coverley Wrote:  I can think of a stadium deal that i wished someone had taken a harder look at to negotiate better
terms before inking the project.

The County hired an am law top 100 firm, Chicago office, to document the stadium deal. Maybe those geniuses with JDs sucked at their a job.

Again though, the casino is a private development, the satdium was not.

Casinos are not entirely a private enterprise. It's funded privately. But state partnered. Regulated and allowed only because the state gets their cut. Call it The Vig. Call it Protection Money since the competition in the market is artificially limited by legislation. Call it tribute. Call it taxes. Whatever gets you through the night.

(05-12-2011 08:08 AM)rath v2.0 Wrote:  And I think its funny the biggest bleeding heart on the board is standing up for the casinos.

Casinos are not regular people or normal businesses. Its mostly a retro tax and a state sponsored license to fleece mostly from the segments of society that can least afford it. Go to the boats in Indiana...its not the bling bling rich and famous. Its mostly the blue collar and the old ladies blowing their SSDI checks.

I voted no. It passed after being voted down repeatedly only because of the millions paid by the casinos to bankroll the slick media blitz against an underfunded opposition. Since it passed, I want the state to grab as much of the pie as they can. Screw em'. They'll make plenty. Wait till the first year report comes out.

By most measures I'm very middle ground. I only seem bleeding heart to you because of your consistently angry skewness to the right...except on this issue...you keep it the liberal chatter coming.

Casinos..."fleecing the poor"????? What happened to free will and self-responsibility?

I voted no because casinos fleece everyone and the net return to taxpayers is minimal. The guy next door loses his shirt and I end up paying for it. Plus, I get almost no enjoyment out of gambling because I know that what I'm "buying" is the thrill one supposedly gets with the small odds of hitting it big.

For the first time ever, last fall I hit one of the river casinos. It was actually on a whim; a Sunday drive kind of thing. Meandered in and came out a few bucks ahead. Yawn. It all seems silly to me.

(05-11-2011 10:04 PM)Overrated Wrote:  I don't know all the specifics. But I do know we are losing a lot of money out of state because we don't have casinos. It seems like Kasich is trying to play his hand aggressively since the casinos have already sunk a decent amount of money into the projects. Hopefully he doesn't overplay his hand.

Yeah but without the exception of Vegas, casino locales are pretty much always sh*tholes. Yeah they usually have well paved roads and a few nice public buildings to point to. But beyond that it is usually a huge deck of undesirables.

Even Vegas's recent run shows what happens when your economy is built on gambling. If you bought a house there in the last 15-20 years, you are basically screwed right now.

Pols love casinos because it is a super easy revenue stream and most pols haven't the slightest clue how to foster stable, long term business development. Face it we don't exactly elect people who have more than a talking point understanding of markets, business and economics.

People should have the right to gamble in any way shape of form they wish. The fact that the government is involved in ANY business related to the gambling or entertainment industries, just shows what a ridiculously improper governmental relationship has been forced upon us and we have come to accept.

The government should get out of the lottery business immediately and stop spending taxpayer money on advertising hawking bullsh*t minted collectible coins and stamps. Casinos should be taxed just like any other business.

(Isn't it funny how the government treats casinos as if they are such a nasty way to take money that they feel completely comfortable fleecing the casinos in the same way the casinos fleece their sucker-bet marks.)

Anyway, when people get tired of seeing their towns turn into a seedy sh*tholes, they will vote to get rid of the casinos. Or not. But none of this should be the business of government to determine.

(05-12-2011 08:08 AM)rath v2.0 Wrote:  And I think its funny the biggest bleeding heart on the board is standing up for the casinos.

Casinos are not regular people or normal businesses. Its mostly a retro tax and a state sponsored license to fleece mostly from the segments of society that can least afford it. Go to the boats in Indiana...its not the bling bling rich and famous. Its mostly the blue collar and the old ladies blowing their SSDI checks.

I voted no. It passed after being voted down repeatedly only because of the millions paid by the casinos to bankroll the slick media blitz against an underfunded opposition. Since it passed, I want the state to grab as much of the pie as they can. Screw em'. They'll make plenty. Wait till the first year report comes out.

What about personal responsibility Rath??? You seem to apply your libertarian/conservative views when you see fit.