Speaker Salvatore DiMasi's statement on casino proposal
"When the Governor embraced casino gambling in September, I raised a number of critical questions I felt needed to be answered before we allowed a casino culture into our Commonwealth. To date, most of those questions remain unanswered and, as evidenced by a Boston Globe analysis published on Sunday, new questions are coming to light.
"The Globe found that estimates for 30,000 new construction jobs from casinos are not only exaggerated, they are absurd. Add to the fact that those figures were taken from Suffolk Downs, a casino advocate, at face value and simply multiplied by three and the argument becomes even more questionable. As of today, it seems like we have a proposal where no tough questions were even asked -- let alone answered.
"The Massachusetts Legislature has made significant investments in sustainable economic development in recent years -- from the film industry to life sciences -- and those investments will pay off with real, good‐paying jobs.
"The Governor clearly has the burden of convincing the Legislature that this casino plan should be adopted. So far, the case has not been made, the evidence isn't there and the Governor's arguments for casinos are clearly losing credibility."
