Would Las Vegas-Style Casinos Hurt Miami?

Miami Herald: Finally, several months after the initial euphoria over the announcement of a Malaysian company’s plans to build a $3 billion mega-casino in Miami, we are seeing the start of a serious debate over whether this would change this city for better or for worse. The battle over Miami’s soul has begun.

Should Miami become another Las Vegas, catering to wealthy Latin American and European gamblers? Or should it build on its status as the Latin American headquarters for multinational corporations, and center for international banking, health services, arts and education?

Or, to put it differently, does Miami want to be known as the home of one of the biggest mega-casinos in the world — if not the biggest one — assuming the Florida legislature approves it? Or does it prefer to be known as an international trade center that already has 1,000 multinational corporations, a brand new University of Miami Life Sciences and Technology Park, and an Art Basel annual fair that ranks among the world’s top fine arts shows?

Malaysia’s Genting Group announced in May that it has purchased The Miami Herald’s waterfront building for $236 million, as part of a plan to build a Resorts World Miami. The mega complex would have four ultra-modern hotels with a total of 5,000 rooms, two condominium towers with 1,000 units, more than 50 restaurants and 60 luxury shops.

According to Genting, the project will create 15,000 direct and indirect construction jobs, and another 30,000 permanent jobs. The mayors of Miami and Dade County have endorsed the project.

But Frank Nero, head of the Miami-Dade economic development agency known as the Beacon Council, broke the near unanimous chorus of support on Oct. 12, warning that the mega-casino project would siphon customers from hotels and restaurants elsewhere in Miami, and would scare away high-paying professional jobs from Miami.

“In Atlantic City, you had more than 300 restaurants and bars prior to the establishment of casinos,” Nero told me in a subsequent interview. “Now, there are fewer than 60 restaurants outside the casinos.”

What may be worse, mega-casinos would ruin Miami’s status as a growing international trade center. Despite its image abroad as a tourism spot, only 11 percent of Miami’s workforce is employed by hotels and restaurants, Nero said.

“If we allow casinos, it will be increasingly difficult to convince a German life science company, for instance, to locate a major research facility at the University of Miami’s new Life Science and Technology Park,” Nero said. “Their image of Miami is not going to be that of a hotbed of research.”

Asked about it, University of Miami President Donna Shalala told me that “I don’t think the introduction of a casino will affect our ability to attract top scientific researchers, since we are well established now as a world class university.” But she added, “I am not expressing an opinion for or against gambling” in Miami.

James Hughes, dean of Rutgers University School of Planning and Public Policy and co-author of a study on Atlantic City’s casinos, says there is a big difference between today’s Miami and both Atlantic City and Las Vegas when casinos were introduced there a few decades ago.

While in Atlantic City and Las Vegas, there was almost nothing before the casinos, “Miami is a completely different story,” Hughes said.

My opinion: It all depends on how Florida legislators would regulate mega-casinos. If gambling corporations are allowed to build giant resorts with blinking lights, surrounded by “Girls, Girls, Girls” signs, pawn shops, and casino company buses roaming the city offering free rides to take seniors to the gambling places, it will kill Miami as an international business center.

On the other hand, if legislators demand that mega-casinos have a discreet appearance, much like the slot machine and poker facilities at Hallandale Beach’s Gulfstream Park, where you don’t see huge casino signs from the street, and if there are laws to prevent Miami from becoming a Mecca for prostitutes, drunks, pickpockets and con artists, the proposed casino resort could be a good addition to the city.

But, for now, I’m not neutral. Considering how vulnerable Florida legislators are likely to be to big money promises at a time of financial crisis, I’m afraid they will be pretty lax at the time of authorizing full-fledged casinos. Unless the regulators convince me otherwise, I think mega-casinos will hurt Miami.

$3 Billion Miami Casino Resort Plan Unveiled

Artist's Rendering of Proposed Resorts World Miami

Sun Sentinel: A company known for glamorous global resorts showed off stunning plans for a massive project that would accelerate Miami's reputation for the exotic — on a prime waterfront site. It's also the first concrete evidence of casino-style gambling in Florida.

Officials from Genting Malaysia Berhad, a $45 billion company, unveiled a $3 billion plan called Resorts World Miami, on the 13.9 acres where the Miami Herald building now sits along Biscayne Bay. Genting proposes 5,200 rooms spread over four hotel towers, two condos with 1,000 units, a convention center and shopping, 50 restaurants and nightclubs covering about 10 million square feet. And, tucked away up on the third and fourth floors, is a spot it will have to fight for: a casino.

"If you just drop a square box with slot machines and table games you won't have much of an economic impact," said Colin Au, a principal in the Genting group. "But we think this will be the finest resort in America."

Florida has tiptoed toward Las Vegas-style casinos, first with slots, then expanding poker, then blackjack (but only for the Seminole Tribe of Florida). Genting's blueprints are the first that go for the whole shebang — including craps and roulette for the first time in Florida.

The casino is planned for the third and fourth floor of an eight-story podium for the hotels. Most Las Vegas casinos offer the ding-ding-ding of slots as soon as you walk in.
"Genting really feels that gambling is just one of many amenities," said architect Bernardo Fort-Brescia, who showed renderings of fish-shaped buildings, breezeways with ocean views and a 3.6-acre beach and swimmable lagoon.

Fort-Brescia sees the Resorts World site as a centerpiece to the three-mile section that runs past Bayfront Park, Bayside, AmericanAirlines Arena and the Adrienne Arsht Center. "When you describe Miami and Florida, you inevitably come back to the water," Fort-Brescia said. "We've captured that relationship with this design."

The state has yet to approve any kind of destination casino, let alone Genting's plan specifically.

"The Genting proposal creates a unique policy decision for state lawmakers that will require balance between generating substantial state revenue and creating a competitive environment where the destination casinos, pari-mutuel facilities and Seminole Tribe can prosper," said John Lockwood, a gaming law expert in Tallahassee who represents several gambling interests.

There's also a case in the First District Court of Appeal, challenging the Legislature's right to approve expanded gambling without a Constitutional amendment. A lower court had agreed the Legislature has the authority; the challenge surfaced after the state approved slots at Hialeah Park.

U.S. Rep. Erik Fresen, R-Miami, and Sen. Ellyn Bogdanoff, R-Fort Lauderdale, say they will propose legislation for companies such as Genting to bid on licenses for resort-style casinos in South Florida. "It won't be geared toward any one vendor," Bogdanoff said. "We're coming up with a concept and a framework, but at the end of the day you're going to have 160 people total [the House and the Senate] poking at this."

Bogdanoff also wants a ban on Internet café gambling and a commission to better regulate all facets of gambling.

Genting, which owns 50 percent of Norwegian Cruise Line, made news on May 27 when it paid $236 million for The Miami Herald property – which will be demolished once the paper finds a new home. Since then, it also bought one of two bank notes for the nearby Omni Center, and two other small parcels nearby.
Genting already has Resorts World operations in Malaysia, Singapore and the Philippines and officials say the Miami one will happen, casino or no casino. "If destination casinos are approved in the next year or two, they'll build it all at once, within three to five years," said Genting spokesman Tadd Schwartz. "If not, they'll build it as the market demands, and take 10 to 15 years."

Officials say the project would create up to 15,000 construction jobs and employ 30,000 in the long-term. The Seminoles, who are in the second year of a five-year, $1 billion contract with the state that allows them to exclusively offer blackjack and other table games, declined to comment.

But if cards and dice start flying at destination resorts in Florida, the Seminoles' payments to the state would be voided. Federal law allows the tribe to have any game offered elsewhere in the state, so Seminole casinos could add craps and roulette. Bogdanoff supports destination casinos because the Seminoles have a monopoly, she says.

"This would create competition in an environment that has none," she said. "Right now pari-mutuels are going for the same market share: Floridians. What we're trying to do is, when people from elsewhere decide on a destination that they consider South Florida."
South Florida horse track, dog track and jai-alai fronton owners don't necessarily speak out against destination casinos, but some are asking the Legislature to ensure "parity in tax and products offered," said Mardi Gras Casino President Dan Adkins. Pari-mutuel casinos pay a 35 percent slot tax and have no table games.

"With parity, the Legislature can preserve the existing dollars and grow from there," he said. "Without parity, new operators would have to produce as much revenue as the entire Las Vegas strip in order to make up for what would be lost."

The bill from Bogdanoff and Fresen wouldn't address pari-mutuels, but Bogdanoff said "we don't want the industry itself to tear itself up, which they historically do."

S. Florida Tourism Dedicates Month to Romance

Miami Herald: South Florida tourism officials are saying "I do" to romance. In an effort to grab a bigger chunk of the nation's $74 billion wedding industry, visitors bureaus are rolling out campaigns to boost the area's reputation as a destination for popping the question, tying the knot and getting away post-nuptials.

The Greater Miami Convention & Visitors Bureau is launching a new nearly $500,000 effort with bridal behemoth The Knot to promote the area to the betrothed, kicking off in the next couple weeks and culminating with Miami Romance Month in June.

"You think about the whole life cycle of the process of getting married," said the bureau's executive vice president-chief marketing officer, Rolando Aedo. There's the proposal, bachelor and bachelorette party, wedding or commitment ceremony, honeymoon and eventual anniversary and vow renewal. "We'd like them to come to Miami over and over."

Miami Romance Month will include deals from hotels, restaurants, attractions, bridal shops and other wedding vendors throughout Miami-Dade, where 21,501 marriage licenses were granted last year. "Every wedding is another bride," said Jacqueline Volkart, general manager of the Ritz-Carlton Coconut Grove, which will participate. "We create guests for life usually."

The tourism bureau - which boasts beaches as well as nontraditional venues like the new Herzog & de Meuron-designed parking garage on South Beach- is working now to encourage all interested parties to come up with romance-themed deals in June. Special offers are likely to catch brides' attention, said Carley Roney, co-founder of wedding planning site TheKnot.com. "They can only go so over budget," she said. "And they really have big wedding visions."

"Miami has a lot of sex appeal to people. They know it's a luxurious city, they know it's a fun city, they know there is great travel to do there," she said. "But I don't think people really know there are amazing wedding professionals there as well, so it could be the all-in-one package."

Although Miami-Dade will observe Miami Romance Month for only one month out of the year, Aedo said the push to bring more weddings-and-romance business to the area - and possibly lure customers away from the Caribbean -will last year-round.

Already an international wedding destination for its concentration of wedding-oriented shops and services, Coral Gables is playing a heavy role in the promotion. The final phase of "Marry Me in Miami" will unfold in a challenge between five couples on a closed-down Miracle Mile on June 22. The Biltmore and other Gables vendors are donating the grand prize wedding.

Tourism officials are hoping that mix of tropical destinations and relative bargains will help their still-recovering industry emerge from the doldrums of the last couple years. Roney said that while more than a third of South Florida brides said their plans were affected by the economy, the weddings still marched on.

"No matter what happens in the economy, the world keeps getting married," she said. "I can see why the visitors bureau says 'Yes, it's great to have all the tourists. But I like the tourists that come and bring 105 guests.' It's a smart investment for an area to say we want more weddings."

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17 Charged in Miami Bar Girl Scheme

NBC Miami: Authorities say a group of Eastern European beauties and their handlers ran a massive scheme to bilk businessmen and tourists out of thousands by luring them to private South Beach clubs for costly booze.

Prosecutors have charged 17 people in the alleged scheme to defraud which was broken up by the FBI, Miami Beach Police and Immigration and Customs Enforcement. According to a criminal affidavit, the scheme was organized by South Beach club owners who brought women to Miami from Eastern Europe to work as "Bar Girls" or "B-Girls."

The B-Girls allegedly went to legitimate clubs and lured the businessmen and tourists to private clubs where the booze fix was in. The unsuspecting victims were charged exorbitant prices for bottles of alcohol, including as much as $5,000 for a bottle of champagne. With the liquor flowing, the B-Girls allegedly ordered bottles of wine and champagne and charged them to the victims' credit cards. Charges were often unsigned, unauthorized or signatures were forged, the feds say.

When victims disputed the charges, the suspects either threatened to have them arrested or gave photos of the victims in the club to credit card companies as proof of purchases.

"This international organized crime group has victimized tourists and defrauded them of tens of thousands of dollars," said John V Gillies, Special Agent in Charge of the FBI's Miami Field Office. "The crimes this group committed have affected our South Florida community and our economy."

Authorities say 88 victims have been identified. At least one was charged as much as $43,000 in the scheme. Feds say the B-Girls generally got a 20 percent take of the exorbitant bills while club owners got 10 percent.

The Feds list six clubs allegedly owned and operated by defendants, four of which have since closed. Steel Toast, at 758 Washington Avenue, and the Tangia Club, at 841 Washington Avenue are still in operation. Sixteen of the 17 defendants were arrested Tuesday night, including alleged organizers Albert Takhalov, 29, Svetlana Coghlan, 41, Isaac Feldman, 50, Stanislav Pavlenko, 39, Fady Kaldas, 35, and Siavash Zargari, 46. 44-year-old Alec Simchuk, remains at large.

Fire at Miami Airport