Panel grapples with economic, social questions on casinos

■ Save the Massachusetts economy with resort destination casinos.

■ Save jobs at the state’s dog tracks by allowing slot machines.

■ Save the state from itself by blocking casino expansion.

It was the first in a series of hearings on the contentious casino issue before the panel, which faces an array of 16 separate gambling measures and the task of merging ideas to produce a new gambling bill as early as January.

While many of the arguments were familiar, the gambling push has an air of near-inevitability: For the first time in years, all three political leaders on Beacon Hill support expanded gambling.

While Governor Deval Patrick and Senate President Therese Murray had been pushing for casinos, former House speaker Salvatore DiMasi actively blocked it last year, before he was replaced by Robert A. DeLeo, who has long supported slot machines, but who last month also came out strongly in favor of resort-style casinos. The Legislature is expected to cull elements from the bills before them and introduce a new gambling bill as early as January.

Given the current economic recession and the governor’s announcement yesterday that he may eliminate 1,000 to 2,000 state jobs, labor and business leaders seized on casinos with open desperation, saying that the threat of social ills from gambling could be managed while the devastating realities of unemployment could not be.

“There is nothing, and I mean nothing, more debilitating and difficult to deal with than not knowing where your next paycheck is coming from,’’ said Bob Haynes, president of the Massachusetts AFL-CIO. “Destination resort gaming offers hope to families that are struggling, plain and simple. And where else will we get this potentially large infusion of revenue?

“How many other industries are willing to come into this Commonwealth and actually pay to play with licensing fees?’’ Haynes added. “How many more firefighters and police officers are we going to have to lay off? We can fix pretty much any problem. Unemployement is unfixable unless you have a job.’’

But even Haynes cautioned that casino gambling could not be viewed as a panacea.

Gambling opponents leaped on reports of economic hardships, even for casinos, to challenge the assumption that it could be a salve for current economic woes. Twin Rivers casino in Rhode Island, for example, is facing bankruptcy and seeking a bailout from the state.

“It’s the worst possible time we could be considering casino gambling,’’ said state Senator Susan C. Tucker, an Andover Democrat on the committee. “Casinos all over the country are going bankrupt.’’

What the economy needs now is for consumers to spend their money at local businesses, she said, prompting one union member to grumble from the gallery, “We don’t have any money.’’

Tucker challenged supporters’ estimates of the millions in economic activity that casinos could bring to Massachusetts. “Start subtracting,’’ she said, adding that those profits would be cut by costs, including new regulations and government employees needed to oversee and audit the new industry.

She said she would prefer to see growth in areas such as one she is promoting in her district in Lawrence, developing old mills into affordable housing. “We have choices about where we grow jobs in Massachusetts,’’ she said.

The testimony drew a wide array of speakers and interest groups, from the leaders of the state’s largest labor and business organizations to a small group from Palmer, a community near Springfield where Mohegan Sun of Connecticut has proposed a casino. (They wore matching navy T-shirts that said “Palmer + Casinos = Jobs.’’)

Mohegan Sun’s chief operating officer spoke, as did the chairman of the Mashpee Wampanoag tribe. The tribe’s plans for a casino were embraced by the town of Middleborough in 2007 but ensnared by a court decision since.

And individuals from quiet corners of the state rose in Gardner Auditorium to offer their own impassioned pleas.

While opponents offered a sometimes hyperbolic view of gambling and academics likened its influence on the brain to that of cocaine, defenders said casinos would increase legitimate jobs for working-class people.

Representative Kathi-Anne Reinstein, a Revere Democrat, said she found it insulting that opponents suggest that casino jobs are not real and that they know what is best for people in her neighborhood.

“I’ll tell you what the majority of my neighbors and I want,’’ said Reinstein, who said she once worked in a casino. “We want gaming. We want the jobs. We want the revenue.’’

A potentially devastating impact on families was cited as a primary reason for opposing gambling and slot machines in particular.

“Why is this not being considered a consumer protection issue when slot machines are very carefully designed to addict people and then to swindle them for everything they have?’’ asked Evelyn T. Reilly, director of public policy for the Massachusetts Family Institute. She contended that, based on estimates of the reach of problem gambling, the addition of several casinos in the state would affect millions of people. “We’re talking here about potentially impacting negatively two out of three people in the state,’’ she said.

A legislator offered dramatic personal testimony about the harrowing effects of gambling in his own family.

Representative Carl M. Sciortino Jr., a Somerville Democrat, said one of his close relatives lost his job, his apartment, and ended up committing suicide “because of the challenge and shame and the struggle,’’ of a gambling addiction.

“There’s no amount of money that can fix the damage that’s been done,’’ Sciortino said.