Cuomo watch: No safe bet on casinos

It could be back to the drawing board on casinos.

Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo initially touted the idea of building the "world's largest" convention center at Aqueduct Racetrack, which already houses a lucrative video slots operation. But that fell by the way side.

This year, he wants lawmakers to approve a plan to limit expansion -- for now -- to just three upstate casinos. But legislators have pushed to include downstate and now some say an upstate-only initiative isn't broad enough to survive a statewide referendum, which could occur this fall.

They figure Indian tribes that already run casinos in New York and gambling interests in other states will spend heavily to defeat a casino-expansion referendum, and without a broad expansion plan that involves various state regions, the referendum will fail. -- Yancey Roy