BANGOR (AP) – The Bangor City Council has approved a deal that will put 1,500 slot machines across the street from the Bass Park complex.
Mainers voted two years ago to allow slot machines at commercial harness-racing tracks, but Bangor officials said putting slots at the track would have been disruptive. So they worked with Penn National to create a separate complex across the street.
The way the law is written, the slot machine complex has to be within 2,000 feet of the center of the Bangor Raceway at Bass Park.
State law forbids Penn National from owning property for gambling, so the company will buy the Holiday Inn and Main Street Inn and give the land to the city. Then Penn National will raze the buildings and construct a $71 million slots parlor that will employ up to 600 people.
The City Council, which approved the deal during a special session Monday, said Bangor gets a slots facility near the harness-racing track without any disruption of events held at the Bangor Auditorium and Bangor Raceway, both at Bass Park.
“The park can have the fairs, have the conventions that are there and right across the street will be a first class gaming facility,” said City Councilor John Cashwell.
The hotel properties are among the few commercially zoned properties large enough to accommodate Penn National’s proposed facility and attached garage.
Penn National hopes to have its $70 million casino open in 2007. Its temporary facility, Hollywood Slots, opens this Friday with 475 slots.
Revenue from the slots will help the harness-racing industry, but horsemen have expressed disappointment in Bangor’s decision to put slots outside the track.
The city also stands to reap benefits. Based on earlier projections, revenue from slots could help the city raise the $40 million to $50 million needed to replace the aging Bangor Auditorium without requiring the city to take out loans.
It also could help spur development of the Bangor riverfront, said Michael Crowley, who was council chairman when the idea of a racino was first hatched.
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