AUGUSTA — The Senate voted Tuesday against direct authorization of a proposed 1,500-slot-machine facility planned for Lewiston’s Bates Mill No. 5.

Senators voted 13-20 against authorization and reasserted their decision last week to send the project to referendum. While the House of Representatives last week voted to approve the project, the Senate’s decision Tuesday increases the chances that the Lewiston casino proposal will go to voters in November.

That prospect didn’t please backers of the Lewiston project or the Androscoggin County delegation. Both said the Senate’s decision was inconsistent with the chamber’s move last week to directly authorize a Biddeford racino and its partner facility in Washington County.

“What’s good for one area of the state should be good for the other,” said Sen. Margaret Craven, D-Lewiston, adding that last week’s vote against authorization was another example of Lewiston getting the short end of the stick.

“Everybody deserves something, except Lewiston,” Craven said during the floor debate.

It’s unclear whether the perceived slight will have an impact on the Senate’s final vote to enact the Biddeford-Washington proposal. The Senate voted 18-17 last week to authorize the project. However, three of those votes came from the Androscoggin County delegation.

Craven indicated earlier this week that she would withdraw her support for the Biddeford project if the Senate didn’t support Lewiston.

The Biddeford bill currently sits in the Appropriations Committee. Once it clears that panel, it will face an additional vote in the Senate before going to the desk of Gov. Paul LePage for approval.

LePage has said that Maine voters should decide the merits of all gambling projects. However, the Biddeford project has been intensely lobbied this session and has the backing of Senate President Kevin Raye, R-Perry.

Adrienne Bennett, LePage’s spokeswoman, said Tuesday that the governor would likely veto the Biddeford project even if it’s the only one to reach his desk. However, Bennett acknowledged that LePage had been in meetings with the project’s proponents, including the developer, Ocean Properties, a respected firm that has historically wielded significant influence in the State House.

The Lewiston project also faces resistance from Black Bear Entertainment, the developer of a casino in Oxford County.

Members of the Oxford County delegation said Tuesday they were concerned that supporting authorization of the one in Lewiston would hurt the Oxford casino.

Sen. David Hastings, R-Fryeburg, said he doubted that the two projects, located about 17 miles from one another, could both survive.

“At least one of them is doomed,” Hastings said.

Last week, Hastings and Sen. John Patrick, D-Rumford, voted to send Biddeford and Lewiston to the voters.

Stavros Mendros, a stakeholder in the Lewiston project, said Black Bear Entertainment had worked hard to preserve “its monopoly” by convincing Oxford lawmakers to vote against Lewiston.

“Oxford isn’t even built yet and already Black Bear has so much control,” Mendros said.

He said he was disappointed in the vote, adding that Lewiston “was pushed aside as a community once again.”

However, he said the project backers were undaunted, even if the project went to referendum.

“I still have no doubt that we’ll win,” he said.

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