United to Stop Slots in Massachusetts

Dear friends,

I would like to invite you to visit the website www.uss-mass.org launched earlier this month by an all volunteer committee of concerned citizens and taxpayers, collaborating with statewide organizations from across the Commonwealth of Massachusetts to stop the legalization of predatory gambling and slots in Massachusetts.

Please sign up to support the work we are doing to defeat the wrong-headed proposals to legalize predatory gambling and slots in Massachusetts. Your comments, suggestions and donations are welcome!

Sincerely,


Kathleen


United to Stop Slots in Massachusetts
PO Box 376
Palmer, MA 01069
ussmass@gmail.com
www.uss-mass.org

Waltham Democratic City Committee - cudos

The Waltham Forum on legalizing predatory gambling in the Commonwealth held last night was outstanding. Tom Larkin is to be commended for his work in organizing this important and dignified community conversation. Bob Logan, Waltham City Councillor and chair of the Waltham DCC, Scott Harshbarger - moderator, and the proponent Tom Hill - Marlborough DCC, chair were gracious in their presence and presentations.

There were approximately 40 people in attendance with local cable access taping the show. It began at 7:15pm and ended just before 9pm with all audience members who chose to offered an opportunity to speak to the group. It was a balanced presentation with the majority of audience members speaking against the legalization of predatory gambling and slots. In attendance were Rep. Koutoujian (D-Waltham) and Rep. Conroy (D-Wayland) as well as Governor's Councillor Marilyn Petito Devaney.

Rep. Conroy spoke about his on-going work regarding cost-benefit analysis of the proposals to legalize expanded gambling. I applaud him for his measured and rational approach to this issue. The Western MA Casino Task Force, USS Mass and many diverse organizations and individuals have called for an independent-balanced, data-driven cost-benefit analysis with full mitigation and budgets to be performed before any expanded gambling is legalized in the Commonwealth. The Governor of New Hampshire recently appointed a commission to perform that task for the our neighboring state. No tax dollars are necessary for a blue-ribbon commission to be appointed to fulfill this basic governmental task.

Thank you again to the organizers and participants - civic engagement in action.

Pssst! Preview of Coming Attractions!

USS Mass - United to Stop Slots is getting ready to launch a fantastic website designed and created by the extraordinarily talented web-designer and blogger Mary Tufts, aka Gladys Kravitz.

Please take a minute to check out the website and join our non-partisan ranks of individuals, organizations and regions in the Commonwealth opposed to predatory gambling.

Members of USS Mass distributed literature to Democratic Legislators at the statehouse today. Next week Republican Legislators will receive educational materials from USS Mass. If you would like to assist in our efforts to Stop Slots in Massachusetts please contact me and sign up on the website.

Meet us on Facebook (search United to Stop Slots)!

Please forward widely.

Sincerely,

Kathleen

Slot and Casino Myths

Slot and Casino Myths - 2009

1.) Casinos will provide thousands of good jobs. --- Casinos will create temporary construction jobs. USS Mass supports sustainable job creation and economic development. Slot parlor and casino job numbers and incomes have been widely overstated by proponents. Spectrum Gaming soundly refuted the job creation numbers projected in Governor Patrick’s legislation to approve three casinos that was defeated in the Legislature. Economic development continues to be overstated by proponents who never account for jobs lost from businesses that fail due to the all-encompassing predatory nature of casino capitalism. Just take a look at Cripple Creek, Colorado. For this and many other critical reasons, USS Mass has called upon the Legislature and the Governor to develop a blue-ribbon commission to perform a comprehensive, balanced, data-driven, cost-benefit analysis of predatory gambling before licensing slots or casinos in the Commonwealth

2.) The tax revenue from slots will balance budgets, lower taxes and
send more money to cities and towns ---

Tax revenues from casinos are lower than projected just two years ago due to the global recession. Mitigation costs continue to rise. Expansion of government to manage the corporate casino industry that has known negatives such as traffic and public safety, crime, bankruptcy, family violence and other social problems creates enormous fiscal burdens on communities and taxpayers. In June, Massachusetts Attorney General Martha Coakley, informed the legislative Committee on Economic Development and Emerging Technologies that other states with regulatory commissions on predatory gambling employ staff of over 500 people alone. Funding for this commission is not included in legislation, and hidden costs such as this will take a huge chunk of that "new revenue". Surveillance, money laundering, purchase of technology and personnel alone will consume hundreds of millions of dollars. Local impacts in the hundreds of millions of dollars will either be paid by the state of the local taxpayers. Connecticut Attorney General Blumenthal confessed at a public forum on casinos that the state of Connecticut made a huge mistake through not planning for or adequately mitigating the local impacts. Revenues from CT casinos have been dispersed throughout the state with the host regions starved of needed funds. It is the position of USS Mass that the Legislature and the Governor have a fundamental responsibility to the people of the Commonwealth to perform a comprehensive, balanced, data-driven, cost-benefit analysis of predatory gambling before licensing slots or casinos in the Commonwealth.

3.) Slots will save the State's racetracks---The people of Massachusetts voted overwhelmingly to close the race tracks last year through Ballot #3. Predatory slot machines are designed to addict players and are a regressive tax policy. The Commonwealth provided for tax-funded job re-training for employees of the tracks to off-set any losses to their employment.

4.) We need to recapture the money going to out-of-state casinos---A small percentage of Massachusetts residents gamble in facilities located in other states. The re-capture of these revenues that have been exaggerated to be as high as a billion dollars a year are in reality almost half that figure. The amount of gambling revenue that “goes out-of-state”, would be re-captured through taxation at approximately 27% according to past and current legislative proposals. Proximity to predatory gambling increases addiction within a 50 mile radius by double. The costs of managing local increases in addicted and problem gamblers, impacts to municipalities, air and water pollution are additional reasons why USS Mass recommends in the strongest terms, that the Legislature and the Governor perform a comprehensive, balanced, data-driven, cost-benefit analysis of predatory gambling before licensing slots or casinos in the Commonwealth.

5.) Gambling is just another form of entertainment---not for those who
are addicted. The casino industry depends on people "playing to
extinction." This is a form of entertainment for some, and a way of
life for too many. Massachusetts residents and Legislators reject predatory lending, drug and tobacco predatory marketing and product misrepresentation. Slots are designed to psychologically prey upon the user. Revenues from addicted and problem gamblers have been analyzed by national expert Professor Grinols to provide 70-80% of all revenues. Therefore, the business model is designed to receive profits from addicted users, not “entertainment”. “Entertainment” is the cloak surrounding the predatory core of the slot machine product and the business model. “Gaming” became the code word for “gambling” in the industry’s marketing vernacular to disguise the core of the business. Gambling by another word is still gambling by another word.

6.) Any new form of revenue is good revenue---Revenue is only positive revenue if it is a net profit and does not harm people and society. Predatory gambling revenues do neither.

7.) The benefits from expanded gambling out-weigh any costs---Really?
Let us repeat our call for the Legislature and Governor to perform their fundamental responsibility to the people of the Commonwealth to perform a comprehensive, balanced, data-driven, cost-benefit analysis of predatory gambling before licensing slots or casinos in the Commonwealth. 40 States, including California, have legalized expanded gambling for revenue purposes. California is almost bankrupt. Our taxes are lower than those in PA, CT, and NJ.

8.) Slot parlors are better than casinos, and will produce almost instant revenue---Actually, slot parlors are worse. 10% of the players account for 90% of the profit, and in this economy, that 10% are those already suffering. This is simply regressive in nature and little job development is created. Money is sucked from the local and regional economies with small businesses and municipalities negatively fiscally impacted.

Thoughts on Senator Edward M. Kennedy

Thoughts on Senator Edward M. Kennedy by my parents Edward T. and Louise F. Conley, members of the Greatest Generation as recorded by Kathleen Conley Norbut, DSC member.

I learned about the passing of Senator Edward M. Kennedy from a retired gentleman at sunrise who was enjoying his daily coffee at the N. Kingstown, RI, Dunkin Donuts. “Did you hear that Senator Kennedy died?” he asked me without introduction. “It’s in the Globe; they’re the only paper to carry it.” I had not heard and we chatted about the end of an era.

I did the first thing that came to mind as I started to process the impact of the loss of Senator Kennedy to the Commonwealth and called my father from our family vacation spot at the Rhode Island beaches to talk to him about the passing of Senator Edward M. Kennedy. My father is a resident of the Chelsea Soldiers Home, he turned 84 years old in July and is a WW II Marine Veteran who served in the Pacific Theatre, including battle on Iwo Jima. When his home care became overwhelming last year due to his multiple health issues and his safety was at risk, I contacted state Senator Stephen M. Brewer (D-Barre) to guide our family with an application to the Soldier’s Home. My mother who is also frail and elderly, had finally surrendered her Irish pride and admitted that she could no longer care for him.

Senator Brewer met with me on a summer afternoon at a picnic table about a year ago in Wales, Mass in between his many engagements of the day. I told him about my father and mother and he listened with great attention and respect. He offered some direction for me to pursue and stated that he would contact some people on my father’s behalf, including my parent's state Senator Patricia Jehlen (D-Medford). Within a couple of days, Senator Jehlen’s office contacted me and offered further direction for our family. Then, to my great surprise Senator Kennedy’s office contacted me to assist in our application on behalf of my father. I was astounded. They knew about my father and wanted to help. Tears in my eyes, I recall being simultaneously grateful, honored and justified that these public servants and their staff would reach out to our family, an average working middle class family, to help us in our time of need. We were scared and vulnerable fearing the costs of long term care, wondering if my parents would have to sell the house they built, had raised six children and lived in for almost 60 years. Even with daily home health aides we had not being able to sustain adequate care for my father’s multiple health issues.

Senator Kennedy’s brain cancer had been announced prior to his extension of assistance to my family. How typical, and how amazing to have the Senator and his staff thinking and working for us when they were vulnerable too. With the assistance of these honorable public servants, my father has a place to live where he is cared for in a government health care system.

My father talked about Senator Kennedy and his slain brothers, President John F. Kennedy and Senator Robert F. Kennedy. He stated that Senator Kennedy, had a, “rough and tragic start” (to his career) and my father was not shy about discussing the tragedy at Chappaquiddick. As a Senator, “Ted was always thinking about the people of Massachusetts and working for better conditions for us.” My father described what it has been like to be a lifelong Massachusetts resident of Irish descent and observe the Kennedy family dynasty. “I have lived to see the Kennedy era from start to finish,” he stated, “they had their struggles like the rest of us, yet they kept moving forward.” Civil rights, decent wages and safe conditions for blue collar workers, good public education for his children and health care are the products of the Senator’s work that my father has received.

My mother who is 81 years old and still works part-time at the Irish Cottage in Burlington, MA began with this when I called her, “I left you a message, I have no one to talk to about this!” Most of her close friends have passed away. We talk about politics continuously and we share a very strong commitment to the values, the long and proud tradition of the Democratic party of advocating for social justice, working for policies that promote the public health, and fighting to protect citizens from exploitation and oppression.

My mother talked about her memories of going to Wednesday night Novenas at Mission Church with “the girls” after work in the late 1940’s. “It’s just what we did on a Wednesday night”. As a Catholic of mixed Irish and English heritage, seeing the Kennedy family rise to prominence in national politics was as groundbreaking to her as seeing an African American rise to the office of the President. Her mother was welcomed to this country with, "No Irish Need Apply" signs in shop windows. She was struck by the fact that Senator Kennedy had visited the Basilica throughout his daughter Kara’s struggle with cancer.

One day when working at the Irish Cottage, a young mother walked in to buy a Cross for her daughter, to have and to hold during her father's absence. She talked about her husband having to return to a second tour of duty in Iraq and worried that the equipment was inadequate. Shortly after that encounter, my mother described learning about Senator Kennedy’s push to provide safe personal armor and vehicles for soldiers. His commitment to military members, their families and veterans was often over-shadowed by the magnitude of his work on education and health care.

His legacy is irrefutable regardless of where one stands on the political spectrum. We lost a lion in the Senate and there is no one of his caliber to fill the void. Indeed that could be said of the Kennedy brothers, including Joe who was killed in WWII, and the rest of the Greatest Generation.

Rest in Peace.