Slots foes trying for 2007 vote Gaming firm unswayed, plans permanent facility

BANGOR – A group seeking to outlaw slot machines in the state – including those at Bangor’s Hollywood Slots – is pushing ahead with its effort to gather enough signatures to put the question before voters in 2007.

“The problems that prompted us to try this in the first place are still there,” said Doug Muir, spokesman for No Slots for ME, a Westbrook-based group that tried unsuccessfully to place the matter on the 2006 ballot. “We see no reason to slow down.”

This most recent attempt differs in several respects from the group’s failed effort, Muir said Monday. Perhaps most important, the group has two potentially fruitful opportunities – the June primary election and the November general election – to gather signatures outside polling places.

To qualify for the November 2007 ballot, as the group intends, it must submit its signatures by Jan. 25, according to the Maine Secretary of State’s Office. The group must gather a number of signatures equal to or exceeding 10 percent of the votes cast in the 2006 gubernatorial election. Based on past elections, that translates into about 50,000 signatures.

If the group is successful in gathering those signatures, voters next year will consider the question, “Do you want to ban all public use of slot machines in Maine?” The wording of the question was approved by state elections officials in March.

Officials at Penn National Gaming, the company that operates the Bangor slots facility, were not surprised by the renewed effort – only disappointed.

Penn spokesman Eric Schippers said the group’s latest attempt to ban slots would not halt progress on Penn’s plans to build a $75 million permanent facility housing 1,500 slot machines across from Bangor’s Bass Park.

“We’re not going to let them stand in the way of progress,” Schippers said. “We’re going to focus on the benefits, and they’re apparently going to focus on destroying jobs.”

But Muir and Schippers have vastly different visions of progress.

To Schippers, the temporary Bangor facility already has provided hundreds of jobs and pumped millions of dollars into state coffers to pay for needed services. To Muir, the money wagered at the facility is money that could have been spent elsewhere in the local economy without the social ills that accompany gambling.

But it’s the mere existence of the Bangor facility, according to Muir, that offers something much more dangerous – precedent for more slot machines in Maine.

“The argument is so compelling,” Muir said, pointing to recent attempts to open a racetrack casino in Washington County. “If there’s one, why shouldn’t every group have a slots parlor?”

He also referred to news reports published last week announcing a Rumford man’s plans to bring casino gambling to Oxford County.

Voters statewide in 2003 approved slot machines at harness racing tracks under certain circumstances. The Legislature then amended the bill to include stricter controls over the new industry.

As it stands, only Bangor meets all of the requirements to host a slots facility under state law.

Dan Tremble, a slots supporter and former Bangor city councilor, said the anti-slots group’s latest attempt was misguided. Tremble pointed to the early success of the Bangor facility, which has generated no major law enforcement problems and has received a warm reception from the city’s business community, he said.

The opposition, Tremble said, is being driven by southern Maine interests in keeping slots out of that region. He pointed to the membership of the group’s high-powered steering committee, which includes the likes of former Gov. Angus King, former Green Party gubernatorial candidate Jonathan Carter and religious conservative activists Michael Heath and Paul Madore.

“They need to just leave us alone,” Tremble said. “They have enough trouble taking care of southern Maine.”

If successful, the proposed slots ban could share the November 2007 referendum ballot with an effort to allow a racetrack casino in Washington County. In January, a group supporting the Down East facility fell a few thousand signatures short of earning a spot on the November 2006 ballot, but has until August to collect the remaining signatures to qualify for the 2007 ballot.