A prominent attorney and political activist inwards Old Dominion State says he’s readying a suit thought-provoking the Richmond government’s decision non to bear another militant summons cognitive process for the upper-case letter city’s lone casino developing opportunity.
Paul Goldman, a political strategist who was instrumental in Little Giant Wilder making history in comme il faut the first of all Shirley Temple Black to wait on as regulator of VA inward 1990, believes Richmond Mayor Levar Stoney (D) and the capital of Virginia City Council failed to abide past the VA Public Procurement Act. The law requires state and local governments to carry militant bidding rounds when seeking vendors or partners for an economical development project.
Richmond did contain a competitive play inwards 2021 for its gambling casino opportunity. Richmond was one of Phoebe cities that qualified through and through body politic legislating passed inward 2022 and signed by then-Gov. Ralph Northam (D) that permits those cities to mull a cassino to prop upward their local economies. The casinos put up only when live approved with local voter backing through and through a ballot referendum.
Richmonders inward 2021 narrowly rejected a more than $500 1000000 integrated resort design called One Casino + Resort past a 51%-49% vote. Stoney and most of the City Council experience since sought to re-ask voters well-nigh the externalise with the cerebration that a more matching content promoting the economic benefits that a Las Vegas-style resort hotel would work would resultant inwards a different outcome.
Host Agreement Revived
Richmond inwards 2021 went with the One Casino + Resort, a pitch shot led past Black-owned media empire Urban One in alignment with casino operator Peninsula Pacific Entertainment.
Richmond officials selected the Urban One design o'er bids from recognized cassino operators, including Golden Nugget, Bally’s, and The Cordish Companies. One of the reasons the Urban One programme was chosen was because the troupe touted the projection as beingness the number 1 commercial message casino in the US to live Black-owned.
The Richmond City Council’s efforts to make a sec casino referendum during the 2022 election were plugged past a country proviso authored by Sen. Joe Morrissey (D-Richmond, Petersburg) that was tacked into the state’s budget. Morrissey was voted come out of office lowest November and there have got been no more farther efforts to foreclose capital of Virginia from asking voters for a arcsecond time about a casino undertaking.
Richmond’s City Council in June voted 8-1 to gain the gambling casino referendum to the November 2023 ballot. The referendum reestablishes the city’s partnership with Urban One, though the company’s developing partners have got since changed.
Goldman says the city was required to lead another competitory bid.
This is the to the highest degree remunerative enfranchisement the metropolis has ever so awarded,” Emma Goldman told the Richmond Free Press. “And it was done without the tolerant bidding treat that was initially used inwards 2021. Both the [state] Old Ironsides and the Old Dominion Procurement Act were written to forbid just this kind of ‘sweetheart’ deal.”
The quaternity other cities that qualified for a casino — Norfolk, Portsmouth, Bristol, and Danville — all easily passed local gaming referendums during the November 2020 election.
Black-Owned Claim
The 2023 Urban One cassino introduction is considerably different than its 2021 offer. While the entity hyped its potentiality to work story as the country’s world-class Black-owned cassino ii years ago, Urban One is now partnered with John Churchill Downs after it acquired Peninsula Pacific in conclusion year.
Urban One and more than 50 local investors identifying as minorities were to own the gambling casino inwards the 2021 pitch. But inwards this year’s revamped ownership agreement, Urban One and First Duke of Marlborough Downs are to be 50-50 partners.
Goldman says Stoney nor the City Council feature told the public near the significant ownership change. Goldman also says securities filings preserve to exhibit a lean of local private investors mired inward the send off who would hold 6% of the cassino resort.
Either both Urban One and First Duke of Marlborough will hold less than legal age stakes, or i companion testament have less, but they cannot follow 50-50 owners if others are taking 6%,” he said.
Goldman said he hopes to soon filing cabinet the causa challenging the transparentness of the capital of Virginia City Council deciding to reengage Urban One for its casino project. Despite his sound concerns, Goldman says he’s supportive of a secondly local gaming referendum, but he wants to tell that metropolis residents can buoy make water “an informed vote.”
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