Nashua lawmakers willing to give speedway shot but protect their own turf

Nashua area lawmakers offered to cut the sites, shrink the size and inject competition to win converts for slot machine and casino-style gambling before a key House committee Tuesday. Gambling developers endorsed the proposal of Reps. David Campbell and Jane Clemons, both D-Nashua, along with Rep. Lynne Ober, R-Hudson, to scale back by 42-percent the proposed slots to 9,750 at five different locations.

The original bill (SB 489) that cleared the state Senate but attracted the opposition of Gov. John Lynch would permit up to 17,000 slots at six sites.

The amendment would still award 3,250 slots at the Green Meadow Golf Club property in Hudson, 3,750 at Rockingham Park in Salem where casino developer Millennium Gaming has purchased an option and 1,500 at the former dog racetrack in Seabrook.

Competing proposals would vie before a three-person state tribunal to secure one gaming site coming from all communities at least six miles north of the Massachusetts border through the Lakes Region and one from

those towns and cities in northern New Hampshire. This change is widely seen as a response to the owners of the New Hampshire Motor Speedway in Loudon who complained they were left out of the original bill.

"It's a marginal improvement for the better," said Edward Dupont, a speedway lobbyist and former state Senate president.

Several lawmakers had said there should be open-ended, publicly bid

contest for the licenses. "I am opposed to the monopoly that the previous bill provided for," said Rep. Timothy Butterworth, D-Chesterfield.

But Campbell stressed that giving Hudson, Salem and Seabrook exclusive entries is critical to getting lucrative license fees of up to $150 million to help balance a two-year state budget dripping in red ink.

"The reason we didn't have competitive review in the south is very simple," Campbell told the House Local and Regulated Revenues Committee. "If we do that, we get no money. This is in recognition of the budget

deficit position we are in."

Ober said the Hudson project would give her town wracked by home foreclosures a big shot in the arm. "We desperately need jobs; we need to move forward," Ober said.

Clemons urged the House panel to tailor the bill to its desires. "Take this and run with it," he said. ''The time has come."

Millennium Gaming lobbyist James Demers said lawmakers here must take seriously the threat posed in Massachusetts where legislative leaders are preparing to ram through within a week legislation that lures

developers with a much lower tax rate and cheaper licensing fees than the New Hampshire bill would.

"I am a strong believer that Massachusetts is going to pass expanded gaming," Demers said. "There is no doubt in my mind that they are going to do it."

Others contend even this amended bill could lose a constitutional challenge as it's expressly to award profit to specific business interests.

Rep. Steve Vaillancourt, R-Manchester, offered a competing proposal for the state to operate the games and extend leases to six facilities with no more than 5,000 slot machines. The state would gain a 60-percent profit in the Vaillancourt model, giving 19-percent profit to the licensee.

The amendment Campbell offered to the original bill would retain a 61-percent profit to the owners of

the slot/casino gaming sites.

"If the state is going to legalize gambling, it ought to maximize the profit from it," said Vaillancourt vowing to oppose the privately-run gaming parlors.

Former Senate Majority Leader Robert Clegg, a lobbyist for the Hudson destination resort developers, said the changes offered Tuesday came after private huddles with wavering committee members. Clegg said there remains hope on April 15 at a showdown vote this could get a positive recommendation from a committee formed and packed two years ago with gambling opponents.

"We're getting close," Clegg confided.

Rep. Carolyn Webber, D-Windham, said she will propose to further sweeten the bill by increasing to 92-percent from 87-percent the pool of betting money returned to gamblers, cutting a $20,000 fine levied against minors caught in these casinos and repealing an unpopular 10-percent tax on all gambling winnings tucked into the state budget trailer bill last June.

Rick Newman, a lobbyist for The Lodge at Belmont, loses an exclusive franchise with the Campbell amendment and declared it could be the death knell.

"You can't amend a bill every five minutes and expect to hold onto votes. This slot bill could prove to be as dead as a doornail," Newman said.