Going All In
Is taking down the casinos a lost cause? Or just a new one?
[ to the death ]
Mark Stehle
DOES THE 'HOUSE ALWAYS WIN?: Casino-Free Philadelphia bets on the long haul.
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If you look at it one way, Casino-Free Philadelphia and its partners have lost virtually every battle they've fought against the two casinos.
They fought for a city ballot item that would require casinos to stay 1,500 feet from any residential neighborhood, only to be defeated by a court ruling. What scant political support they once had has vanished. They've asked city officials not to grant the casinos special zoning laws and permits — to no avail. When they demanded that the Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board deny Foxwoods' recent application for a renewal of its gaming permit, the PGCB voted to approve it.
The group (which earned honors in our Big Vision Issue this year) does claim one victory that no one can yet take from them: Some three years after the state informed Philadelphia that, like it or not, it would host two casinos, neither is up and running.
But last week, the PGCB dealt yet another blow to the anti-casino movement when it approved a $355 million financing plan for SugarHouse. Representatives claim construction could be complete in as little as 10 months, and plan to hold a groundbreaking ceremony in the next couple of weeks.
It's not, on the face of things, a bad time to ask whether Casino-Free's fight is even remotely winnable.
And yet the group seems to be as energetic as ever. Why?
Part of the answer has to do with a subtle transformation that's taken place within Casino-Free, especially over the last year. Without giving up on their many skirmishes over permits, zoning, etc., the group has increasingly focused on casinos as a predatory industry, pointing to studies that suggest that huge portions of casino revenues come from problem and pathological gamblers, and that casinos are designed — from the machines to the placement of ATMs in the parlor — to coax as many visitors as possible to "play to extinction" (an industry term which means playing until you are broke).
And so they've begun to view their cause from a much wider perspective: Call it the long view.
The expansion of legalized gambling in the U.S. — and especially slot-based casinos — in recent years is without precedent. Just 30 years ago, a tiny handful of states even had lotteries, and only two hosted casinos. Today, 41 states (and D.C., and Puerto Rico) have lotteries; 29 have American Indian casinos; 12 states now allow so-called commercial casinos like SugarHouse and Foxwoods.
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In response, an even younger movement has begun to grow up against them. Casino-Free Philadelphia might look, from here on the ground, like an isolated cause — even a lost one — but some see it very differently.
"This issue is one that's come for me to symbolize everything that's broken about America," says Leslie Bernal, executive director of Stop Predatory Gambling. And Philadelphia, he says, "is the Montgomery of the movement to stop predatory gambling. ... It's the biggest city that is potentially going to have a casino in its downtown. This is the gambling industry putting its flag down and saying, 'We're going to take it all.'"
His reference to Montgomery, Ala., the birthplace of the modern civil rights movement, may sound extreme — "It's not a comparison, it's a source of inspiration," Bernal explains — but he doesn't use the term lightly, either. A former chief of staff to a Massachusetts state senator, his own passion for the cause was partly inspired by famed civil rights biographer and historian Taylor Branch, who, it turns out, is a passionate opponent of legalized gambling and spoke at Stop Predatory Gambling's kickoff event last fall — an event which Casino-Free members attended and which they say helped shape the direction of their thinking.
Indeed, Casino-Free will begin a new phase in its opposition to casinos next week, when it launches a new campaign of "direct action" — or civil disobedience — on the SugarHouse construction site. Nearly a hundred members have signed a petition pledging their willingness to take "nonviolent direct action" against the casinos. In a recent interview on Radio Times, Casino-Free attorney Paul Boni affirmed that the group would lie in front of bulldozers if it comes down to it.
The group's expanded focus, from fighting the casinos' locations to opposing the very means by which they profit, has made them new friends. As we point out in this week's CP Choice Awards [see p. 23], Casino-Free has managed to attract a much broader coalition than when it started, made up not just of neighborhood residents but religious leaders, as well.
Until the doors of SugarHouse and Foxwoods open for their first day of business, Casino-Free Philadelphia won't concede the seeming inevitability of that happening — other than to point out that their mission statement is to stop casinos from opening, "and close any that open."
So far, no group anywhere in the U.S. has managed to close a casino — but none has ever tried blocking bulldozers, either.
Points out founding member Jethro Heiko, "Isn't this the city of Rocky? Come on!"
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