After Richmond loss, Urban One remains focused on owning a casino
Urban One is firmly committed to owning a casino resort.
Urban One is a Maryland-based media conglomerate that owns and operates radio and television stations primarily aimed at the black community. The company hopes to build an integrated resort-casino in Richmond worth more than $500 million. Voters in Virginia's capital, however, twice rejected citywide referendums needed to approve the project.
Richmond residents narrowly rejected Urban One's 2021 casino proposal in a 51% to 49% vote. Voters again rejected a similar Urban One proposal last month, but the vote was more decisive, 62 percent to 38 percent.
Nasdaq-listed Urban One released its third-quarter earnings report this week and held a conference call with shareholders and analysts. During the conversation, Urban One CEO Alfred Liggins revealed that the media company wanted to own a casino.
In March, Urban One sold a stake in Maryland's richest casino, MGM National Harbor, just outside the state capital, Oxon Hill, for $145.5 million. Urban One was invited by MGM Resorts in 2016 to make passive investments in integrated resorts to diversify the project ownership structure.
Future Intentions
Liggins reiterated Thursday that the company intends to expand further into casinos.
Yes, exactly. “It’s a great business,” Liggins said."We made a lot of money on our MGM investment. We made about 3.5 times our investment."
Liggins recognizes that the U.S. economy is much different today than it was when the $1.4 billion MGM National Harbor Casino was built and opened in December 2016.
"There are risks. You can overbuild and now interest rates are higher," Higgins said.
Richmond Denied
Richmond city officials have selected Silver Spring Company as Virginia’s capital’s preferred gaming partner for 2021. Despite a lack of experience developing and/or operating casinos, the Richmond Resort Casino Review Board selected Urban One over competing offerings from Bally's Corporation and The Cordish Companies, which operate Live!-branded casinos in Maryland and Pennsylvania.
The Richmond Casino Review Committee, handpicked by the City Council, hopes to ensure social justice by selecting Urban One. The proposal, dubbed ONE Casino + Resort in 2021, is more than half of a billion-dollar project being developed in partnership with casino operator Peninsula Pacific Entertainment (P2E). The casino proposal involves more than 50 individual investors, many of whom are minorities.
Undeterred by the wishes of Richmond residents, city officials and Mayor Levar Stoney (D) launched a second gaming referendum in 2021, with Urban One remaining their development partner. To fuel growth in 2023, Urban One has partnered with Churchill Downs following its acquisition of P2E.
The change didn't matter as residents of the capital once again rejected casinos.The vote was split along demographic lines, with wealthy areas more likely to reject the project than working-class areas.
Maryland Chances?
Ideally, City One would develop a casino in its home state of Maryland, where the company is best known. Maryland gambling laws limit the number of casinos to six. However, there are opportunities for the industry to expand, as state voters have recently been supportive of the issue of expanding gaming.
During the November 2008 election, Marylanders passed a statewide referendum to amend the state constitution to allow five locations in Anne Arundel, Cecil and Worcester counties, as well as one in Baltimore. Slot machines are set up at a city casino and a state-owned property in Rocky Gay. State Parks.
A subsequent referendum in 2012 approved tabletop gaming. A referendum question in 2012 also included approval of a sixth casino, a license ultimately awarded to MGM.
In 2020, voters continued to expand gambling through retail and online sports betting.
There are now moves to legalize online gambling with another gaming referendum. Can Urban One convince state lawmakers to pass a provision on internet issues? Including gambling to open a seventh casino in the Old Line State? This is pure speculation at this point, but Maryland residents appear poised to further expand their legal gambling options in the state.
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Source: www.casino.org
