I sure hope you don't bet the house at the coming casinos:
"Conn. casinos employ hardball tactic to collect debts; Foxwoods and Mohegan Sun, two of the firms gunning for casino licenses in Mass., use tactics rare in their very tough-minded industry" by Mark Arsenault | Globe Staff, February 09, 2014
REVERE — In 2006, years before Mohegan Sun arranged to lease 42 acres for a proposed casino and hotel at Suffolk Downs, the company went after a much humbler piece of real estate in the neighborhood, the home of an elderly man who had gambled far beyond his means.
Mohegan Sun won a court judgment to place a lien on 45 Clark Road, a white cape owned in part by Louis H. Cutler, an 80-year-old retiree who failed to repay $36,000 the casino had lent him for gambling.
Foxwoods, too, put a lien on Cutler’s house, in 2007, seeking repayment of $30,600 in gambling credit, plus interest and fees.
Not only is the collection tactic uncommonly aggressive — a number of industry specialists said they had never before heard of casinos using it — but the liens raise questions about whether the businesses allow or enable gamblers to extend themselves too far.
I fold.
Cutler’s 2007 bankruptcy filing declared that his sole income was a monthly Social Security check of $640, yet two of the world’s biggest gambling palaces — both applicants in the Massachusetts casino sweepstakes — had lent him more than $66,000 to make bets, and then went after his house when he could not pay it back.
“It’s extremely hard-core predatory behavior,” said Tom Coates, who runs Iowa’s largest credit counseling service and works with problem gamblers.
The two Connecticut tribal casinos have placed dozens of liens on homes across the state since the early 2000s, for amounts as small as a few thousand dollars, according to a Globe review of land and court records....
Experts interviewed by the Globe — including current and former casino executives, academics, problem gambling counselors, and a representative of the American Gaming Association, the commercial casino industry’s trade group — said it is unusual for a casino to use property liens to collect debts.
“Frankly, I have not heard of any casino company that goes after homes,” said Whittier Law School professor I. Nelson Rose, an international expert on gambling law. “It’s really extreme.”
Mohegan Sun, in a response letter to the Globe, said the company “treats this issue seriously and takes significant measures to ensure credit is extended in a responsible manner and that our policies to seek repayment of debt are equally responsible.”
The casino also defended the practice of using liens.
“Your inference that our methods of seeking repayment are somehow more aggressive than other gaming companies is not accurate,” said the letter from Charles Bunnell, chief of staff of the Mohegan Tribe. He noted a controversial practice by Nevada authorities to prosecute unpaid gambling debts as crimes.
The whole indu$try is a crime if you a$k me.
Foxwoods declined to comment. “As a matter of policy we do not discuss any topics that may involve litigation,” said Dale Wolbrink, the casino’s public relations manager, in an e-mail.
People gamble their way into financial disaster all the time — it’s one of the main arguments used by casino opponents — often by draining their own bank accounts, tapping college funds, or maxing out credit cards.
Casino credit is supposed to be only a convenience for big players who don’t want to travel with thousands of dollars in their pockets, not a loan for people lacking the assets to play, said industry consultant and author Gary Green, who has managed casinos. He said gambling companies normally run credit bureau checks before issuing credit, to see if the customer can afford the advance....
*******************
Over at Foxwoods, Lucille Ciampi, 70, of Boston never thought she had a gambling problem; for her, playing slot machines was just a relaxing getaway.
“Some people like golf,” Ciampi said. “I like to pull the arm.”
Some people would say the same about a smoke.
Then on one overnight visit, “I had lost my money and didn’t have any more on me,” she said. “I was staying over so what was I suppose to do? Look at the stars? I thought lemme get some credit.”
Getting credit was “very easy,” she said, and even easier once she developed a record of paying it back. Then, one time, “I ended up with more credit than I should have gotten.
“The machines spun me around like a merry-go-round,” she said. “I got a lot of credit. It was too much and I couldn’t afford it. I couldn’t pay it back.”
Foxwoods put a $11,663 lien on Ciampi’s house in 2009. She later negotiated a settlement to get the lien removed.
She looks forward to playing in a Massachusetts casino someday, though never again on credit.
One Massachusetts blackjack player said Foxwoods, which is now seeking to build a casino in Fall River, originally approved him for just a few thousand dollars in credit, but raised the limit when he asked for more.
“I got it up to $12,000 in a matter of months,” said the player, in his 60s, who asked not to be identified due to the stigma associated with compulsive gambling. “They don’t care. They know they’ll get their money in the long run.”
In 2012, the casino put a lien on the player’s Southeastern Massachusetts home. “It’s on there until I sell the house or it’s foreclosed on,” the player said. He still gambles sometimes, with cash, hoping to win his way out of a very deep hole.
The simplest way for a casino to minimize unpaid gambling debts is to be very conservative with credit, said Anthony Ricci, chief executive of the company that owns Parx Casino, in Pennsylvania, and a partner in a slot parlor proposal at Raynham Park.
“I love being able to say for the record that we have never put a lien on anybody’s house,” said Ricci. “Nobody in the Legislature who voted for this casino bill is going to want to see us putting people out of their homes.”
They weren't thinking of that when they saw the pile of chips they were going to collect.
Jay Snowden, chief operating officer for Penn National Gaming, another applicant for the Massachusetts slot license, said the company bases credit decisions on the financial history of each applicant, as well as the casino’s relationship, if any, with the applicant.
“We much prefer cash business,” he said.
*************************
According to Billy Bell, 71, of Revere, who knew Cutler as a friendly bachelor, who did not talk about the trouble he was in with the casinos and may even have misled people about it.
“I got the impression the casinos banned him for being too good,” said Bell.
That's the talk of someone who has lost his shirt.
*************************
Liens, which accrue 12 percent interest a year, cloud the title to a piece of real estate, meaning the home cannot be sold or refinanced unless the debt is paid off. In certain circumstances, creditors can force the auction of the property to satisfy the debt.
And I thought casinos were going to save us.
The casinos were the only creditors Cutler listed in his bankruptcy filing. The court record catalogued his slim financial holdings. Beside the home he shared with his elderly sister, the entirety of Louis Cutler’s listed earthly assets were these: $75 in cash and $250 in the bank; a life insurance policy with a cash value of $387; $200 in clothing, $1,000 in “miscellaneous household furniture’’; and a 1995 Buick Park Avenue with 117,000 miles on the odometer. Cutler said the car was worth $700.
The court in 2007 granted Cutler’s motion to avoid the liens, because of bankruptcy rules that protect a debtor’s residence.
Cutler died three years later, at 84.
They won't be able to get any more money out of him.
--more--"
"Mass. AG seeks ban on liens by casinos; Actions targeted gamblers’ homes" by Mark Arsenault | Globe staff, February 11, 2014
State Attorney General Martha Coakley urged Massachusetts regulators on Monday to prohibit casinos from placing liens on the homes of patrons with unpaid gambling debts, calling the practice “deeply concerning” in a letter to the state gambling commission....
Coakley cited an article in Sunday’s Globe that detailed the longstanding practice by the two large Connecticut tribal casinos, Mohegan Sun and Foxwoods, of placing liens on homes of residents who owe the casinos money advanced for gambling.
Casino industry specialists have said it is unusual for a gambling business to employ property liens as a collection tactic.
“This story highlights the need for a robust set of consumer protection regulations before these establishments begin operations,” Coakley wrote....
Related: Attorney general rejects gambling ban question for 2014 ballot
Related: Coakley Campaign in Crisis
I gue$$ that is what happens when you are looking out for other monied intere$ts.
--more--"
Time to up the stakes:
"Casino firms to fight repeal effort in Mass.; Seek to keep gambling law item off ballot" by Mark Arsenault | Globe Staff, January 27, 2014
Several casino operators competing for gambling licenses in Massachusetts are preparing to file a motion with the state’s highest court, seeking to keep a proposed repeal of the state casino law off the November ballot.
We were never asked what or play was.
The coalition of gambling companies, which also includes Massachusetts voters who want to protect the casino law, is expected to intervene as early as Monday in a lawsuit already pending before the Supreme Judicial Court, according to people with direct knowledge of the coalition’s plans but who are not authorized to speak publicly about it.
If the casino backers prevail in court, they could quash the repeal effort without a statewide vote and a potentially expensive referendum campaign.
The legal motion expected this week by casino backers reflects a growing concern that the casino operators who are selected to build the state’s first casinos will be soon asked to pay massive — and nonrefundable — licensing fees, even though the threat of casino law repeal still hangs over their pricey projects.
“It would be a gamble” for the companies to pay the fee, said Carl Jenkins, managing director at the financial firm Duff & Phelps, who has studied the local casino market.
Well? Isn't that their bu$ine$$?
The state would also be taking a risk by accepting the nonrefundable fees while the repeal question is unresolved, said Jenkins. “If the law was repealed, I’d wager there would be a significant number of lawsuits against the state,” he said....
Pretty good odds!
Casino opponents, who argue that state voters never had a chance to directly weigh in on whether to open Massachusetts to the gambling industry, responded with a signature drive to put a repeal of the casino law on the November ballot....
The case is expected to be argued in court in May, and decided by late June or early July. If the casino opponents win the case, voters would decide the repeal question in November....
In the meantime, the gambling commission expects to award its first licenses....
In their attempt to intervene in the case, the gambling companies will support Coakley’s argument that the repeal would amount to an illegal taking of contract rights, as well as raise the argument that the petition was improperly drafted because it includes an issue unrelated to casinos....
Polling performed last November by the Western New England University Polling Institute suggested that 61 percent of Massachusetts adults support the establishment of casinos in the state, and just 33 percent oppose it, which was similar to the results of polls in 2009 and 2010. Support plummeted when the projects got too close to home: just 42 percent said they would support a casino in their own community, while 55 percent were opposed, according to the survey....
Oh! The closer they come the more we don't want 'em!
The “challenges have never been successful,” but “If I were [a gambling company] considering investing in coming to this state, I’d think twice.”
--more--"
"Casino foes line up new legal team for repeal push" by Mark Arsenault | Globe staff, January 31, 2014
The casino law repeal movement, once largely dismissed as the whimsical campaign of a few antigambling zealots, has assembled a legal team of experienced constitutional specialists to carry the fight for a statewide repeal vote into the state’s highest court, amid signs that the repeal effort is gaining strength.
Two Boston lawyers who have worked in the state attorney general’s office, Thomas O. Bean and H. Reed Witherby, will lead the team representing the anticasino citizens campaign Repeal the Casino Deal in an ongoing case before the Supreme Judicial Court. The central question for the court to decide is whether a binding question to roll back the casino law and ban the casino industry from Massachusetts will appear on the November statewide ballot.
The state’s casino applicants, each of which has already invested millions of dollars in their bids, are taking the repeal effort seriously. Five of the six applicants for gambling licenses to be awarded this spring filed a legal motion Monday to intervene in the case, arguing that the repeal question should not appear on the ballot.
“They don’t want the people to vote,” said Bean, speaking of the casino industry. “It’s reasonable to say they are concerned.”
A new poll suggests that opponents may have a shot to overturn the law, if they can get the repeal on the ballot.
Fifty-three percent of registered voters support locating casinos in Massachusetts, while 39 percent disapprove, according to a January 16-19 survey by The MassInc Polling Group. The poll of 504 registered voters, conducted for WBUR, had a margin of error of 4.4 percent.
Casino supporters should be concerned about the relatively close results, said Steve Koczela, president of The MassInc Polling Group.
“Just because you’re ahead right now, I would not sleep easily with that kind of margin,” Koczela said. “The numbers can move, especially late in the game.”
Earlier polling done late last year by the Western New England University Polling Institute showed greater public comfort with the casino industry.
That survey, performed last November, suggested that 61 percent of Massachusetts adults support the establishment of casinos in the state and that just 33 percent oppose it, which was similar to the results of polls in 2009 and 2010.
Massachusetts legalized casino gambling in November 2011, establishing a state gambling commission to license as many as three resort casinos and one slot machine parlor.
No casino project can win a license unless residents of its host community endorse the plans in a local referendum, and over the last year, casino opponents have killed several projects at the municipal ballot box, defeating referendum in West Springfield, East Boston, Palmer, and Milford.
Opponents also launched a signature drive to put a repeal of the casino law on the November ballot.
But Attorney General Martha Coakley concluded last year that the repeal petition was unconstitutional, saying the repeal would “impair the implied contracts between the commission and gaming license applicants” and illegally take those contract rights without compensation, according to the decision issued Sept. 4.
She $ucks.
Leaders of the repeal movement appealed to the Supreme Judicial Court, winning the right to collect signatures while the appeal is pending. They collected more than the minimum 68,911 valid signatures necessary to qualify for the ballot.
Meanwhile, residents of Springfield, Everett, and Revere have voted in support of resort-style casinos, and Plainville, Raynham, and Leominster voters have backed slot parlor proposals.
Revere voters will go to the polls again, on Feb. 25, to decide the fate of a new casino proposal from Mohegan Sun.
The gambling commission is scheduled to award the state’s sole slot parlor license in late February and two resort casino licenses by May.
The repeal case is expected to be argued in court in May and be decided by late June or early July.
Bean, a partner at Verrill Dana in Boston, is a former Massachusetts assistant attorney general, who has argued cases before the US Court of Appeals and the Supreme Judicial Court, according to the repeal group.
Witherby, from the Boston firm Smith Duggan, was an assistant attorney general for seven years and has argued dozens of appellate cases.
The lawyers agreed to take the case at discounted rates.
“This case is not about whether casinos are good public policy,” Bean said in an interview. “It’s about whether the people will get to vote.”
Witherby said litigation over the 2008 ballot effort to ban live dog racing in Massachusetts applies to the current lawsuit over the question to ban casinos.
“If the owner of a dog track that has been licensed for decades can’t prevent the people from voting to outlaw dog racing, it’s hard to see why mere applicants for a license should be able to prevent the people from voting on casino gambling,” said Witherby.
Three other lawyers are helping the repeal effort on a pro bono basis: Matt Cameron, who also advises the No Eastie Casino citizens group; David Kravitz of the firm Murphy & King; and Margaret Monsell, a staff lawyer at Massachusetts Law Reform Institute, according to the Repeal the Casino Deal campaign.
--more--"
Related: Clergy lead fight against casino plan in Revere
In casino race, lawyers, lobbyists winning big
Also see:
MGM makes pitch for its casino in Springfield
Wynn, Mohegan Sun joust for Boston casino license
Mohegan Sun faults rival Wynn in casino bid
I'm tired of all the infighting as to who gets to $crew us.
If we must build a slot parlor . . .
They will come, right?
UPDATE: Casino operators take on Disney in push to expand
I didn't know Donald Duck had a gambling problem.
