Slot Machines

The approach to National Harbor, where three highways meet on the Maryland side of the Potomac River, is pretty much a wow, with the arched 18-story atrium of a massive convention hotel its centerpiece. National Harbor is a still-new resort town on a slope overlooking the big river, with six hotels, upscale shops, restaurants, condominiums, marinas and a busy schedule of events that attract healthy crowds on weekends. David Cordish must look at Nat Harbor and wish he'd thought of it. Or maybe he wishes the place had been available as a location for gambling four years ago, when Maryland voters approved the return of slot machines to the state.

Hoping to turn around the struggling resort, Maryland's slots location committee awarded a license Thursday for a casino at Rocky Gap Lodge and Golf Resort in Allegany County. The Video Lottery Facility Location Commission voted unanimously to issue the license to Evitts Resort LLC, the sole remaining applicant after the panel eliminated a group led by former Democratic Party Chairman Nathan Landow in January. The license is contingent on Evitts getting construction financing, but company officials do not expect that to be a problem.

If ever there were a matter of public policy that exemplifies the hypocritical and disjointed state of Maryland's legislative processes, it is gambling, in general, and the legislative inaction on gambling legislation in the General Assembly in the recently concluded session. For the record, gambling, in one form or another, has been legal in Maryland for decades, to include the state lottery, established back in the 1970s. For longer than that, slot machines have been legal, on and off, in different counties thanks to the passage of county-specific state laws.

Oseh Shalom, 7515 Olive Branch Way, will hold a Casino Night on Saturday, April 21 from 7:30 to 10:30 p.m. Games include blackjack, poker and roulette tables; Wheel of Fortune; and slot machines. A live/silent auction includes 51-inch HD television; suite at Verizon Center for a Wizards game; and one-week stay at a three-bedroom house at Deep Creek Lake. Wine, cheese and desserts will be served. Admission is $36. For tickets, call Oseh Shalom at 301-498-5151.

In an effort to settle a dispute that has tied up the state budget and put a timely adjournment in doubt, a Senate committee approved a new, stripped-down gambling expansion bill Saturday morning. The legislation is expect to come to the floor during the session going on now (as of 11:25 p.m. Saturday.) The bill OKd by the Senate Budget & Taxation committee is an attempt to get voter approval of three basic principles in this year's election and to leave the details to the next General Assembly session.

Oy! In Baltimore Sun story outlining the frenzy of lobbying surrounding a bill to expand gambling, we overlooked one key person: Super-lobbyist Bruce Bereano. He's working the gambling bill for the D.C. Building Trades. And a company called Innovative Entertainment of Maryland -- which makes slot machines --  hired Bereano in recent weeks. Papers filed with the state ethics commission show that Bereano was the 11th most highly compensated lobbyist in Annapolis last year, reporting $613K.

Maryland's House of Delegates narrowly approved a bill Saturday that would provide $1.2 million to the owner of a racetrack and casino on the Eastern Shore, setting aside objections from some lawmakers who called it a giveaway to the "one percent. " The bill would divert revenue earmarked for enhancing racing purses to provide operating assistance for the Ocean Downs Race Track, so long as the track has 40 live racing days. It is owned by William Rickman, a politically connected developer.

Table games would be allowed in Maryland along with a sixth casino in Prince George's County, if a measure on the Senate floor tonight is passed by the General Assembly. The bill is set for debate in the Senate Monday evening and, if it passes, it will miss a key deadline for consideration in the House of Delegates. The lower chamber is thought to be unfriendly to the bill. The legislation would change how the slot machines for casinos are purchased. Now the state buys or leases them, but under the new plan casinos would take on that burden.

Four trucks laden with 100 slot machines arrived early Wednesday morning at the nearly completed casino at Arundel Mills mall. For the next two hours, workers wheeled banks of the gleaming new machines, one by one, inside on hand trucks. Installation of the first set of slots moved Maryland Live! Casino, the state's largest, another step closer to its scheduled opening in three months. That's progress for Maryland's lackluster gambling program, which has yet to be fully implemented more than three years after voters approved five slots locations statewide.

Like many horse racing tracks across the country, the Ocean Downs harness track on the Eastern Shore is hemorrhaging money. It lost an average of $2 million annually for the past five years. Ocean Downs' owner, William Rickman, wants the state's help. He is pushing a bill, scheduled for consideration Wednesday by a Senate committee, that would allow the state's two harness tracks to keep using a share of the purse money generated from Maryland's casinos to support daily racing operations.