Two gaming veterans partner for Live! Hotel & Casino
Greenwood Gaming & Entertainment and the Cordish Cos. of Baltimore team emphasize their experience in gaming in pitching Live! Hotel & Casino in South Philadelphia.
Two gaming veterans partner for Live! Hotel & Casino
Jennifer Lin, Inquirer Staff Writer
The Philadelphia and Baltimore companies behind the Live! Hotel & Casino project emphasized their status as power players in casinos, as well as the “simplicity” of their plan.
Greenwood Gaming & Entertainment, which operates the Parx casino in Bensalem, is joining forces with the Cordish Cos., which controls Maryland Live! as well as two Hard Rock casinos in Florida, to propose a hotel and casino in the stadium district in South Philadelphia.
The second presentation of the morning had less razzamatazz than the Market8 show, but Joe Weinberg, the managing partner of the Cordish Cos. of Balitmore, had these words for the seven-member gaming board:
“Greenwood and Cordish provide certainty that this project will get done and get done quickly,” Weinberg said.
Some of the highlights:
- Greenwood and Cordish are using their own equity to pay for the project. No debt.
- Weinberg said the location in South Philadelphia will “minimize cannibalization” with the region’s other four casinos in Bensalem, Valley Forge, Chester and Fishtown
- Project would generate $300 million a year in revenue, with $130 million going to the state and city in tax revenue.
The partnership behind Live! Hotel & Casino is called the Stadium Casino, of which Cordish will control 50 percent; Greenwood Gaming 33 percent; and Sterling Trust 17 percent.
Greenwood Gaming head Bob Greene said the Stadium Casino group would bring “simplicity, certitude and viability."
“I would not commit to and promise anything that we could not deliver,” Greene said.
900 Packer avenue is the Holiday Inn...but that is a picture of the Turf Club...which is it?— frankatlasalle- From someone who isn't impacted by any of the proposed projects, the commonsense place would be the out of site - out of mind (at least for most people) Stadium area. However, I think the most exciting area would be North Broad Street.— imustgoih82bl8
- Simplicity is not what i want to hear from a proposed casino applicant— Nightman76
- It's the Holiday Inn site.
— henry hill - I suppose the recent huge donation extracted by Congressman Brady from Parx for the Manayunk bike race can't hurt their chances of winning the gaming license.
— Pugh - The second best alternative. The first is at 8th and Market, hands down for all concerned, given the potential.— Ben Fan
- We heard this same song and dance back in 2005 and look what we got.
When governments make vices legal you’re left with no other choice but to put regulations into the laws that govern these vices. When it comes to the gaming industry vice I know that putting regulations into gaming laws things like No 24/7 Gambling, No Free Booze, No Smoking, No Check Cashing, No Interest Free Credit, No Free Play, No Comps, and making casino operators send Casino Monthly Statements along with making them and their employees intervene when their patrons are gambling excessively will stop the ‘BREEDING’ of compulsive casino gambling degenerates who will become criminals. These regulations will also make it an even playing field for business owners that are within a 10 to 20 mile radius of casinos, especially those who have liquor, food, and entertainment licensees.
To learn more about this ‘VICE’ know today as ‘GAMING’ go on line and Google-up Bill Kearney on casino gambling.
— Bill-Kearney
Parmley covers the Atlantic City and Pennsylvania gaming industry for business news, while Lin covers development issues in Philadelphia for the metropolitan staff.
