We're just two months away from the opening of the Rivers Casino on the North Shore. Today, the casino released a list of charites that will benefit from the pre-grand opening test run (the test nights are scheduled for Saturday Aug. 1, 2009 and Monday August 3, 2009).
The beneficiaries will be the Allegheny County World War II Memorial, the Urban League of Greater Pittsburgh, The Greater Pittsburgh Food Bank, and Allegheny General Hospital.
Moving on ...
... If you haven't been to The Rivers' Web site lately, they've been busy updating it with the names of all the bars and restaurants, plus promotional information.
... Pennsylvania slots revenues are up almost a fifth, year over year:
"Slot machines in Pennsylvania generated $178.4 million in gross
revenue last month, an 18 percent gain compared to May 2008, regulators
said Tuesday. Numbers were helped by the new Sands Casino Resort Bethlehem, which
generated $10 million in revenue in May. Comparing the seven casinos
that existed a year ago, revenue was up 10.8 percent."
... Follow the money:
"It doesn't happen exactly as it does in 'Ocean's Eleven,' but every
dollar of the more than $1 million netted by the Sands each day is
tracked. From the time a bill leaves a person's wallet until it is
loaded into an armored car, it goes through a gantlet of check points
that includes surveillance by employees watching 42 high-definition
monitors above the casino floor, and counting in massive machines in a
bunker-like room beneath the Sands. It's all part of an almost obsessive effort by casino operators and state regulators charged with seeing that Pennsylvania gets every penny of its 55 percent cut."
Dispatches from the border
"Backers of a proposed four-casino ballot measure already have spent thousands of dollars to
gather signatures to get on the November ballot. But could they be having second thoughts?
Penn National Gaming Inc., the Pennsylvania gambling conglomerate that's supplying much of the
money and strategic mettle for the proposed Ohio ballot measure, might yet back out in order to
shoot for the 2010 ballot, analysts concluded after meeting with the company's senior
management." (Via the Columbus Dispatch.)
... Allowing table games in Delaware would mean more jobs.
Until next time ...
Posted
Jun 09 2009, 03:08 PM
by
Bill Toland