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Casinos in Chicago?
This story originally appeared in Crain's Chicago Business News

February 1, 2007

State Representative Lou Lang still has visions of expanding gaming in Illinois, but this time he says his attempt to put casinos in the Chicago area won’t be undermined by Gov. Rod Blagojevich.

At a news conference Tuesday, Mr. Lang, D-Skokie, unveiled his proposal to authorize gaming licenses for the city of Chicago, the south suburbs and Waukegan and add slot machines at horse racing tracks. He says his plan would boost state tax revenues from gambling to $3.5 billion a year from $2.3 billion.

“This is a bill I believe the gaming industry will sign off on,” Mr. Lang said. “A bill that will move forward.”

It’s his latest attempt at expanding the state’s gaming legislation to allow for more casinos than the nine currently operating in the state. Illinois has granted licenses for 10 casinos, but the last license is currently tied up in state court after being revoked from Emerald Casino Inc.

Mr. Lang now proposes that the 10th license be awarded to a casino that would be built within 10 miles of O’Hare International Airport. The last time Mr. Lang tried to pass legislation that would expand gaming, Gov. Blagojevich “pulled the rug out from under” him, Mr. Lang says. He says that will not happen again.

“I met with the governor on the bill, but not the details,” Mr. Lang said. “I said, ‘All I want to know is will you stay out of the way? Will you allow me to move it through and pass it and then read it?’ He said, ‘Yes,’ which is not what he said before.”

But Gov. Blagojevich has no plans to expand gaming, according to a spokeswoman in his office.

“We’re putting our budget proposal together now and we aren’t proposing more gaming, but we’ll look at lawmakers’ ideas,” the spokeswoman said.

In addition to authorizing new licenses, Mr. Lang’s proposal calls for the creation of an Intercity Development Fund of up to $25 million to help economically distressed communities in job training and economic development. An opponent of gambling chastised Mr. Lang’s proposal, saying it would exacerbate gambling addiction and create other problems.

“Given that Illinois has spent 10 years trying to deal with the one license they have open and unable to do so, creating three new licenses in addition to Chicago is absurd,” Doug Dobmeyer, spokesperson for the Task Force to Oppose Gambling in Chicago, said in a statement.