New Dallas-Fort Worth Committee on Texas Casino Proposals May Allay Fears
News that the North Texas Commission (NTC) will set up a committee to study proposed casino gambling in the Dallas-Fort Worth (DFW) metroplex is getting praise from some experts who follow the controversial issue.
The NTC committee will look at the impact that one or two casinos could have on the DFW region and how they would impact economic development, the workforce, infrastructure, transportation, and public safety.
“It will provide a venue in which skeptics and critics of destination resort casino legislation can have their questions answered and concerns allayed, potentially reducing any extant opposition,” Mark P. Jones, a professor at Rice University, told .
“And it will underscore to Republican state senators and representatives who are still on the fence regarding destination resort casinos the preference of many of their key stakeholders for destination resort casino legislation.”
Bills to pave the way for destination casinos in Texas have failed to get needed legislative approvals. Legislation is likely to be reintroduced in 2025 as a large number of Texas voters appear to back the proposals.
DFW Senate Republicans are Key
Jones said seven Republican state senators whose districts include portions of the DFW metroplex are “the most crucial to the destiny of casino resort legislation in 2025.”
If the legislation is eventually approved and Texas voters back a constitutional amendment, work by the new committee “will enable the DFW region to hit the ground running immediately,” Jones predicted.
“Key stakeholders in a wide range of industries spanning construction, convention, and social welfare can brainstorm and come up with a concrete set of plans which can be put into action the moment legislation is passed in the Texas Legislature,” he added.
Clyde Barrow, a political scientist at the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley, told that if the committee works well, it “will provide detailed information on the economic and fiscal benefits of casino gaming (at least in DFW), as well as detailed and quantifiable information on the social and economic costs of legalized gambling, such as problem gambling prevention and treatment, local infrastructure costs (e.g., roads, off-ramps, signaling, water and sewer), regulatory costs, and public service impacts (e.g., police, EMS, fire protection).”
These types of studies allow state and local government officials, as well as the business community, to critically assess the claims of lobbyists and move toward legislation that could truly benefit the state and potential host municipalities,” Barrow said.
The committee will be made up of representatives from the region’s businesses and wider community, according to the Dallas Business Journal. Members still need to be appointed.
The new committee was discussed at Wednesday’s roundtable discussion sponsored by the NTC and the Texas Association of Business. Among those backing casino legislation at the roundtable was Andy Abboud, senior vice president of government relations at Las Vegas Sands (LVS). Chris Wallace, CEO of the NTC, is also supportive, the Journal reported.
Limited Number of Casinos
Aboud told the roundtable that Texas wouldn’t have casinos in every community.
It doesn’t need to be everywhere,” Abboud said. “It doesn’t need to be on every corner. If you diminish the market, you diminish the investment and you’re just diminishing the economic impact that it can have.”
George Zodrow, professor of economics at Rice University, was hired by LVS to do a study on the issue. He predicted that gambling could add $13B to the state’s economy and lead to 70K permanent jobs. DFW alone could see $34.7M in added tax revenue.
The formation of this committee by the NTC is expected to provide a platform for critics and skeptics of casino gambling to voice their concerns and possibly shift their opposition, as mentioned by Mark P. Jones.
In the context of the DFW metroplex, the proposed casinos could potentially generate significant revenue for the region, as suggested by George Zodrow's study for Las Vegas Sands.
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