Weatherford and Gaetz agenda will include gambling bill focused on compact

With Florida emerging as one of the largest gambling states in the nation, legislative leaders are prepared to put gaming regulation on center stage in the next two years and renegotiate the revenue-sharing compact with the Seminole Tribe at least a year early.

House Speaker Will Weatherford and incoming Senate President Don Gaetz are vocal opponents of expanding gambling, but both told the Herald/Times that they believe it’s time to take a comprehensive look at all gambling in the state and include the tribal compact, which now brings the state $233 million a year.

“We currently have a lot of gambling in the state of Florida, but we have to take a very holistic view,” said Weatherford, a Wesley Chapel Republican. “There needs to be clarity and direction as to where the state is going,” he added, and the tribal compact will “very likely” be part of that.

The Broward-based tribe is the owner of the Hard Rock Casinos in Hollywood and Tampa and five other casinos in Florida. Its agreement with the state gives the Seminoles the exclusive right to offer blackjack and other table games in Miami Dade and Broward counties through 2015 in exchange for annual payments to state and local governments.

Legislators imposed the expiration date when they ratified the compact in 2010 to give the state time to take a comprehensive look at Florida’s gambling laws. Renewing it would allow the tribe to take up the issue before voters would take up a proposed constitutional amendment sought by the Malaysian-based casino giant, Genting, in 2014, and before political winds in the Legislature change in 2015. More here.

Genting's election year strategy: big checks and many bets

Genting Group, the Malaysian casino giant, is seeding its bets across Florida’s political spectrum this election year as it continues to secure the foothold it needs to build a Miami casino empire.

The company, which bought the Miami Herald building in downtown Miami with $236 million in cash in 2011 and tried unsuccessfully to get destination resort casinos approved by lawmakers this year, has spent $1.3 million so far in the 2012 election cycle and has embarked on a two-pronged political strategy.

Half of its money has been steered into a petition drive for a pro-casino amendment to the state Constitution that would bypass the Legislature to bring casinos to Florida. The other half of its cash so far — $486,000 to the Republican Party of Florida and $111,000 to the Florida Democratic Party — was primarily given before the legislative session and is being used to back incumbents or political committees, according to a Herald/Times analysis of campaign reports.

The company said it has no direct involvement in any local or legislative races, countering rumors that it has recruited and screened candidates, and says that the cash it has sent to the parties is being steered to the campaigns of casino supporters and opponents alike. Story here.

Read more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/2012/07/21/2905553/casino-giant-gentings-political.html#storylink=cpy

New poll reveals Florida is still very divided over casino gambling

A new survey by Tampa pollster Paul Fallon shows that Floridians haven't budged too much from previous polls on their views about casino gambling: they're still deeply divided with 50 percent in support and 43 percent opposed. The percentage of people in support has grown, however, compared to a Miami Herald/Tampa Bay Times poll in January which found that 44 percent of likely voters in Florida opposed casino gambling while 42 percent were opposed, with a margin of error of 3.5 percentage points.

Here's Fallon's assessment:

Court upholds Hialeah's slot machines, last chance blow to competitors

The Florida Supreme Court on Friday quietly upheld a lower court ruling allowing Hialeah Racetrack to offer slot machines.

The court dismissed appeals by Calder Race Course, West Flagler Associates with owns Magic City Casino and Florida Gaming Centers, which owns Miami Jai Alai, who argued that when voters approved slot machines in Miami Dade and Broward they intended to limit the number of permits to the seven parimutuels that were currently operating.

The notice came quietly Friday on a a day otherwise focused on the court's ruling on the Legislature's redistricting maps. The ruling validates a decision by the First District Court of Appeal in Tallahassee last November which affirmed a lower court decision and said that the law passed by the legislature to allow Hialeah Racetrack to offer slot machines was constitutional.

It also puts an end to the years' long appeal by the racetrack's local competitors who wanted to prevent them from getting the slot machines. The state issued a slots license to the track in 2010 but owner John Brunetti has not installed them.

The appeals court said "the Legislature has broad discretion in regulating and controlling pari-mutuel wagering and gambling under its police powers." Judge  Judge Marguerite H. Davis wrote that the constitutional amendment approved by voters "provides no indication that Florida voters intended to forever prohibit the Legislature from exercising its authority to expand slot machine gaming beyond those facilities in Miami-Dade and Broward Counties meeting the specified criteria.

Florida lawyers hit jackpot, representing gaming interests in Tallahassee

Just last month, Florida’s lawmakers put legislation to legalize destination resort gambling on hold. But even without the mega-casinos, Florida lawyers continue to hit the jackpot, reaping significant business from a gaming industry that promises more growth in the state.

This recent push to approve Las Vegas-style gambling started when Malaysia-based Genting Group, one of the biggest international casino developers, entered Florida in a big way a year ago. It bought the giant waterfront Miami Herald property in downtown Miami for $236 million and announced it wants to build a mega-resort casino on the site.

To accomplish its goal, Genting hired two South Florida law firms for its real estate, zoning and land-use work. At Akerman Senterfitt, managing partner Neisen Kasdin represented Genting in its land acquisitions and continues to handle its land-use, zoning, environmental and permitting needs. “There are still ongoing site development issues,” Kasdin said. Genting also hired Al Dotson and Vicki Garcia-Toledo at Bilzin Sumberg in Miami to handle land-use and development-rights issues related to its downtown Miami property.

Of course, Genting also hired a team of lobbyists across the state to gain approval for casino legislation in Tallahassee. Even though proposed legislation died, Genting’s effort to bring destination resort gambling to Florida has just begun. That means the legislative loss should result in continued work for Florida lawyers as Genting contemplates its next move.

Read the story here: 

'Bu11sh!t' and 6 other key moments in the failed Florida casino push

Colin Au paced the polished marble floors of Miami’s fanciest hotel, waiting for the go-ahead to jumpstart a lavish development plan already on a fast track.

Au and his fellow Genting executives had stunned the city five months earlier on a May morning by announcing the Malaysian casino company’s purchase of The Miami Herald headquarters and plans to build a massive “destination resort” there. Genting promised a resort so spectacular and grand that it would lure vacationers from around the world, with or without a change in Florida’s gambling laws to allow a casino.

That was the plan, and now that plan was about to change dramatically. Minutes before a ballroom reception at the Four Seasons Miami, Genting Chairman K.T. Lim arrived with the news he had just signed a $161 million deal to gain control of the Omni complex adjoining The Miami Herald land. Genting promised to open a casino there within six months of Florida changing its laws.

“We are taking a calculated risk,” Au said just before unveiling his plan to a crowd of local business leaders and elected officials. “We are responding to the concerns and trying to create jobs as fast as possible. The Omni is what’s called a decorator-ready solution.”

But the effort was beset by certain political realities and at least one key message foul-up by Au, who repeatedly called some criticisms "bullshit" during a Florida Senate committee.

Story here

Read more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/2012/02/11/v-fullstory/2650674/casinos-at-the-crossroads-7-key.html#storylink=cpy

Legislators reject attempt to clarify regulation of slot machines

State gambling regulators are in a bind.

They have indirectly authorized the expansion of gambling in the past six months as lawyers for parimutuels found holes in state laws and opened the door to slot machines at parimutuels across the state and table-game look-alikes at existing racinos.

Now state regulators worry that Florida’s porous gambling laws also might come with a cost: the loss of the $233 million annual check from the Seminole Tribe of Florida under its gambling compact with the state.

Tuesday, lawyers for the Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation asked the Legislature for help in closing one of the loopholes that, they fear, threatens the compact with the tribe. They were turned away.

Casino debate may be dead, but it's changed Miami landscape

The bill to bring casino gambling to South Florida may be dead for now, but the issue has reshaped the region’s business landscape in ways likely to last for years.

Nine months after Genting stunned Miami with its $236 million purchase of prime waterfront land and launched a divisive debate over the future of South Florida’s economy, interviews with advocates on both sides reveal much has changed.

Miami gained a major new player on its corporate roster: Genting, the Malaysian-based casino giant that now can claim one of the largest commercial real estate holdings in Miami. Business groups and community leaders picked sides on an issue that has been percolating for years, while South Florida itself quickly emerged as a potential powerhouse in the increasingly competitive casino market.

Here’s a look at the legacy — for now — of South Florida’s casino battle:

Lines finally drawn on casinos: In recent years, Las Vegas Sands and Miami Beach’s Fontainebleau pushed efforts to loosen Florida’s gambling laws to allow casinos beyond Indian lands, racetracks and jai-alai frontons. As early as 2008, aides to Boca Raton developer Art Falcone were organizing a lobbying effort to allow a casino on a downtown Miami site he owns. More here.

Read more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/2012/02/03/2623745/casinos-in-limbo-but-the-issue.html#storylink=cpy

Fresen says casino bill is 'dead for the year'

Rep. Erik Fresen, who had been meeting with members for days to rustle up the votes, was resigned to the fact that the effort to pass a resort casino bill is done.

"I think it's dead for the year in the House,'' he told reporters after pulling his bill before the House Business and Community Affairs Committee could vote. "Adding, I can't speak for the Senate.''

He said he wasn't disappointed, in part because he never expected the bill would be easy to pass in the conservative House.

"To be disappointed would be that I had expectations of incredible victory on this bill,'' he said. 

Tribe to Legislature: You regulate, not ban, Internet Cafes, you lose our cash

As the bill to bring resort casinos to Florida appears doomed, the legislative battle shifts to the debate over whether legislators should regulate or outlaw the slot-machine look alikes operated by the so-called Internet Cafes under a loophole in the state's sweepstake's law.

As that debate moves to center stage, a legal opinion written for the Seminole Tribe of Florida dated Feb. 1 could be a game changer.

"...it is our opinion that SB 380/HB 467 would authorize the play of gaming devices that would violate the Tribe's exclusivity,'' wrote Joseph Webster of the Washington, D.C. firm of Hobbs, Staus, Dean & Walker in a five-page letter to the tribe's general counsel Jim Shore.