A member of the Maine Gambling Control Board has resigned and is speaking out against proposals to expand the number of slot machines in Maine.

In his resignation letter to Gov. John Baldacci, Mike Peters of Dixfield said the state must do all it can to stop the spread of gambling.

Maine is not benefiting as promised from the state’s only slot machine facility, Hollywood Slots at Bangor, and further expansion of gambling could create “grave harm” to the people of Maine, Peters wrote in his letter, dated April 3.

“If we do not act to reduce the shameful profits being made by gambling operators and the coalition of beneficiaries that support them, our state and our people will soon be overrun with the few getting rich at the expense of the many,” Peters wrote.

“We have an obligation to do things that are right for all of our people, not just a privileged few,” Peters told the Bangor Daily News Wednesday in a telephone interview. “That’s how I honestly feel.

“I want to protect my state,” he said. “I don’t want to damage the operation in Bangor because the people voted for that,” he said. He did say, however, that the state and Bangor, Hollywood Slots’ host city, “left money on the table” when they negotiated their portions of the proceeds.

“I testified before the Taxation Committee right after I resigned [from the gambling board] and I gave them a way for Bangor and the state to make more money from this,” he said. His suggestions included a $6 admission fee for slots patrons, $4 of which would go to the state and $2 of which would go to the city. Another suggestion was to put a sales tax on gambling.

He said a large factor in his decision to step down from the board was his belief that he could have more impact on slowing the spread of slots as a private citizen than as a member.

Lawmakers this month gave approval to a proposal to allow the Passamaquoddy Tribe to build and operate a harness racing track and resort with slot machines in Washington County. If Baldacci vetoes the bill as expected, Mainers would vote on the measure in a statewide referendum in November.

The Penobscot Indian Nation is also seeking to have lawmakers allow them to operate 400 slot machines during high-stakes bingo games on their reservation. Meanwhile, a Rumford-based group launched a campaign last year to collect signatures to force a statewide referendum to allow a casino in Oxford County in western Maine.

Some of the state’s nonprofit groups also are pushing for the right to operate slots.

“All they see is free money,” Peters said by phone Wednesday. “If we don’t stop this, we’re going to have them on every corner.”

Peters, who was appointed to the five-member gambling board in August 2004, wrote that he expects other board members to resign. He said Wednesday he is concerned that further departures will take away valuable knowledge and experience from the board.

“There are some other folk of good moral fabric on the board and they suffer from the same affliction that bothers me – a desire to do what is right for all the people of Maine,” Peters wrote.

Rep. Donald Soctomah, the Passamaquoddy tribal representative, said a racino resort – with a hotel, conference center and restaurants – would go a long way toward helping Washington County, where unemployment rates are high and incomes are low.

The state is being unfair, he said, in expanding its state-run lottery games and allowing slot machines in Bangor without allowing the Passamaquoddys a similar opportunity.

“It’s pretty sad for [Peters] to make this dance now just when the tribe’s doing this initiative and to try to base his resignation on that,” Soctomah said.

Peters said a Down East racino simply won’t work.

“There is no market for it,” he said.

Gambling establishments like the one in Bangor and the one proposed for Washington County draw the lion’s share of their patrons from within a 35- to 50-mile radius, and Washington County’s total population is under 35,000 people.

He also said it was unlikely the Washington County facility would attract many Canadians. New Brunswick, just over the international border, now has one slot machine for every 206 people.