AUGUSTA – A measure that would authorize a casino in Oxford County is part of a growing list of bills that would expand gambling in Maine, and it’s a trend Gov. John Baldacci vows to stop.

“I will prevent, as much as I can, this being done by the Legislature,” he said Wednesday. “It can’t be done in the dark of the night when everyone is headed out of Dodge.”

Baldacci said he does not understand why there are several proposals before the Legislature to expand gambling, and he plans to oppose all of them. He wants any expansion decided by the voters, not the Legislature.

“My bill does that,” said Rep. John Patrick, D-Rumford, sponsor of a measure introduced Wednesday that would send to the voters a proposed casino in Oxford County. “This would be on [the] ballot this fall, or I have been thinking maybe on the ballot in November of ’09.”

The legislation would grant Evergreen Mountain Enterprises LLC the right to operate the first casino in Maine with up to 4,500 slot machines, and the ability to offer many other types of gambling, including blackjack, poker, dice, roulette, baccarat, money-wheels and bingo.

The Evergreen group has been circulating petitions to initiate legislation allowing the casino, but it did not have enough signatures by this year’s deadline to submit the legislation.

“What I am doing is just speeding up the process a bit,” Patrick said.

Hollywood Slots at Bangor, the current Bangor racino, has slot machines but does not have the authority to engage in the wide array of gambling activities set forth in the Oxford County proposal. Neither does the initiated bill before the Legislature from the Passamaquoddy Tribe that would allow the establishment of a racino in Washington County.

In addition to the racino and casino measures, lawmakers are also considering legislation that would allow nonprofits to operate five slot machines per location. And the Penobscot Nation has a bill to allow it to operate 400 slot machines to offset the bingo revenue it has lost since Hollywood Slots began operation.

“I think the nonprofits have lost some revenues as the result of the racino in Bangor,” Patrick said. “That’s why I support letting them have some machines.”

He is the House chairman of the Legislature’s Legal and Veterans Affairs Committee, which has jurisdiction over gambling legislation. He said there is strong support for additional gambling as indicated by last week’s 12-1 vote in support of the Passamaquoddy proposal.

Sen. Debra Plowman, R-Hampden, the only GOP senator on the committee, disagrees.

“That is a lot different than the casino proposal,” Plowman said of the Passamaquoddy measure. “I opposed the casino proposal three years ago, and I oppose this one.”

She is “absolutely amazed” at the number of gambling bills proposed this session, and she believes there are further gambling bills yet to be printed. She said the racino has support among lawmakers because it is highly controlled gambling, with the revenues used to support the harness racing industries, the commercial tracks and “Maine’s heritage.” A casino would not do those things, she said.

“It is so easy to keep track of the money going in and going out,” she said of the racino. “We would not have that at a casino. There is money on the table; there is money that passes across the table. It is an industry where you can’t keep track of the money.”

Baldacci said Maine’s economic future and prosperity will not be helped by additional gambling in the state. He said the state needs to invest in education, research and development and other basics of economic development.

“There is no quick fix,” he said, “certainly not more gambling.”

Patrick doesn’t see it that way. He believes Maine is losing “discretionary entertainment dollars” to out-of-state gambling facilities because Maine does not have a casino.

“This is economic development,” he said. “I know the governor disagrees, but it is economic development; it creates jobs.”

The casino bill has yet to be scheduled for a hearing, and some other measures dealing with expansion of nonprofit gambling have yet to be printed. The Passamaquoddy racino proposal may face its first legislative vote as early as today in the House.