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“It Looks Highly Unlikely”

Massachusetts House speaker Sal DiMasi said yesterday that lawmakers would concentrate on health care and other issues in the waning days of the fall legislative session and were not likely to take up the slots bill that was passed by the Senate 26-9 in October. ”I can’t say for sure that I’m going to say, ‘No,’ for this year, but it doesn’t look likely — it looks highly unlikely,” DiMasi told the Boston Globe.
The bill would have allowed 2,000 slot machines to be installed at each of the state’s four racetracks. As written now, the slots measure is part of a simulcasting bill that must be passed this year for the tracks to remain open. There’s no mention in the article of that complication, but I would bet that’s because the plan is to uncouple the two once it becomes clear slots are really, truly dead this year and pass the uncontroversial simulcasting portion in the session’s final hours.
Or not: Track owners say they’re preparing to hand out pink slips, just in case a simulcasting-only bill isn’t passed.

Posted in State Issues on November 7, 2005

No Vote Scheduled Yet

With little more than two weeks remaining in the 2005 Massachusetts state legislative session, no vote has been scheduled in the House on the slots bill passed by the Senate in early October. Supporters of the bill say more than 90 House lawmakers are ready to vote yes on the measure, but House leaders, including gambling opponent representative Dan Bosley, have left them guessing when the matter might be taken up, and House speaker Sal DiMasi is still mum on where he stands on the issue. A spokeswoman for the speaker told the Boston Herald that, “At this point, I don’t think he has made up his mind … And I don’t think we have a timetable.” The bill could be introduced next January. There’s just one problem with that — the slots measure has been tied to a simulcasting bill that must be passed this fall for the state’s four racetracks to remain open.

Posted in State Issues on November 1, 2005

Slots Get Another Hearing

Another hearing at the Massachusetts State House was held on Tuesday to address a slots and simulcasting bill passed by the Senate on October 6. Representative Dan Bosley, longtime gambling foe, chaired the hearing and stuck to his position that any good that might come from slots would be outweighed by the bad. He did, however, promise to bring the matter to a House vote before the legislative session ends on November 15 (Lowell Sun).

Posted in State Issues on October 19, 2005

On the Sidelines?

Joe O’Donnell is sitting out the Massachusetts slots debate (Boston Herald):

He has plenty at stake in this latest, and perhaps last run at getting slot machines into Suffolk Downs and the Bay State’s other racetracks.

O’Donnell holds the controlling share in Suffolk.

And there is strong belief in some circles that his considerable juice is required to get Gov. Mitt Romney off his absolute-veto pledge against slots.

But the Hub’s leading power broker (see Boston magazine) says he won’t be calling in any favors on Beacon Hill.

Says O’Donnell: “Personally I think [slots make] all the sense in the world … But I don’t want to take a personal leadership role in this. I have a personal relationship with, and am very fond of, the governor, the speaker and the Senate president. They’re all friends of mine.” Cynically I wonder if it’s more that O’Donnell — a real estate developer partially responsible for the Shops at Suffolk Downs mall built on land previously owned by the track across the street from the barn area — is interested in something other than slots or horseracing.

Posted in State Issues on October 15, 2005

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