Will Ohio Finally Have Casinos?

Ohio looks to have casinos on the ballot for the third time in November of 2008. The first two times, the casinos were rejected by the voters, thanks to a strong anti-gambling push. Have the times changed in Ohio for casinos? Maybe, and depending on who you ask, it will be a landslide vote one way or the other. Myohionow.com, a company based in Minnetonka, Minnesota, has purchased property in southwest Ohio (Wilmington, Oh) to build a 1,500-room hotel, 220,000-square foot casino. Why will this ballot succeed in November? Why would it fail? Let's explore both options.

For the ballot to succeed this November, Ohioans will have to decide they're fed up with rising costs, losing jobs and bigger companies leaving for tax incentives out of the area, and out of the state. Indiana and Michigan have legalized casinos, and people in the Columbus, Cincinnati, Toledo and Cleveland areas leave regularly for these destinations. Bringing back these tourists and local people to spend their money in Wilmington will increase local tax revenues, statewide revenues (each of Ohio's 88 counties get a share of the tax revenue, averaging over $1M per yr, per county, according to MyOhioNow.

The additional, IMMEDIATE impact will be to local Wilmington residents. Recently, the package delivery service DHL, which has a regional hub in Wilmington, announced it will close that hub and subcontract it's air freight to UPS. Over 6000 jobs will be lost in a town with just over 11,000 residents. This represents disaster for a town who would have over half of its residents unemployed at the exact same time. Another reason this ballot will succeed this year is because the economic conditions have changed.

Gone are the days of long commutes to work, gone are the days of families driving long distances for vacations. Many families are opting for "staycations", staying closer to home for vacation. A resort such as this would provide shopping, entertainment, child-friendly activies and much more, all within a three hour drive from anywhere in Ohio, and less than two hours from big cities such as Cincinnati, Dayton, and Columbus.

Ohio recently started having Keno machines at race tracks, private clubs and public locations with a liquor license. Although the jury is still out, Forbes.com had a pretty interesting story on how Keno in Ohio is viewed from different points of view.

This ballot will fail for the following reasons: Anti-Gambling activists who use scare tactics and statisics to show how casinos promote crime, gambling addicts, blight on the area and more. However, one can take a look at Lawrenceburg, Indiana over the last eight years since the Argosy Corporation launched it's riverboat casino after Indiana voters agreed that gambling should be legal. A town, which this author has visited for years before the casino, and the last eight years since the casino, has grown from a small, Indiana bordertown, to a city with new streets, new police vehicles, a new regional hospital, a developed riverfront and so much more. They have also been able to maintain that small town feel, while doubling their population.

Wilmington will be a brighter and nicer place to live with a casino in its midst, as well as BECAUSE of the casino. While that may appear to be an opinion, there are no areas in the United States that upon placing a casino, the place went down economically instead of going up. Myohionow.com notes that there has never been a casino to open in the Midwestern United States, and close. That says alot for the staying power and the economic power of a casino.