Nassau ready to cash in on casino proposal

Daily Point

A lease announcement — without the lease

Surrounded by business and labor leaders, Nassau County Executive Bruce Blakeman and Las Vegas Sands chief executive Robert Goldstein made a big splash Wednesday morning when they announced that they had come to an agreement to hand the Nassau Coliseum lease over to Sands, which hopes to build a casino resort at the site.

There’s only one problem: So far, no lease has been filed — or made public.

That apparently won’t happen until Friday when it supposedly will be officially filed with the Nassau County Legislature clerk’s office.

But it turns out Blakeman, who spent the last four months negotiating the lease with Goldstein, might have had a special reason for wanting to get the deal done and announcing it to the world.

Last week, Hofstra University filed a lawsuit against the county planning commission, suggesting it violated state open meetings law when it met regarding a potential casino resort at the Nassau Hub. County spokesman Chris Boyle at the time called the lawsuit “frivolous.” And even before the suit was filed, the lease agreement was nearly done, sources said.

But the lawsuit “annoyed” Blakeman, multiple sources told The Point, spurring him to get the deal finalized and announced.

Sands and county officials are hoping the legislature will vote on the lease at its next full meeting on May 22. Public hearings will be held before that date.

The timing is important for Sands, too, though its goalposts continue to shift. Sands needs to have a lease in hand when it applies to New York State for a casino license — one of three being offered to downstate locations. That application process is underway but has been delayed by the state’s Gaming Facility Location Board, which is still responding to bidders’ first round of questions, which were due in early February.

After the first round of answers is released, bidders will have another 30 days to issue another set of questions. License applications will be due 30 days after the board responds to those second-round questions. That means bidders like Sands will have until at least July — and possibly even later — before their applications are due.

According to Blakeman’s description of the lease (The Point doesn’t have a public copy to analyze), there’s another reason the county would want to move the lease forward. Within 60 days of the legislature’s approval, “Las Vegas Sands is going to write the county of Nassau a check for $54 million,” Blakeman said Wednesday.

That, according to Blakeman, is unconditional, and not based on whether Sands gets the casino license from the state.

According to Blakeman’s explanation of the agreement, on top of that lump sum Sands will have to pay $5 million in annual base rent on the site starting immediately, before any casino license is approved. If the state gives Sands a license, the base rent will increase to $10 million annually, Blakeman said. Once the casino opens, Nassau would receive an additional $25 million a year, on top of the base rent. And after the casino has been operating for three years, that annual revenue stream would rise to $50 million a year.

Another $1.8 million per year will go toward policing and public safety improvements for the area surrounding the Coliseum, if the license is approved, with half of that available without a license. Additional funds would be earmarked for the Town of Hempstead. And, if the license is approved, Sands will earmark $4 million for added community benefits for surrounding areas, including Uniondale, Hempstead Village, Garden City and East Meadow.

Altogether, Sands would be on the hook for $96.3 million a year for county, town, public safety and community payments if the casino license is granted. Without the casino license, the total payment would amount to $7.9 million, nearly double what the county gets now — a single $4 million rent payment.

Blakeman said he “can’t imagine” a scenario where the state would not give Sands a license.

“We’ve got the best site, we’ve got the customers, we’ve got everything in place, we’ve got the infrastructure, and we’ve got the community support,” Blakeman said. “So, I believe that we have the best shot to get a license here in Nassau County.”

Nonetheless, Blakeman said the lease includes “contingency plans” if the state doesn’t grant a casino license to Sands, requiring the company to build a hotel, entertainment center and some housing.

But for now, only a select few, including Blakeman, Goldstein and county lawmakers who, sources say, have received a “draft” form of the lease, know what’s really in it — and whether it’ll be a deal the legislature can’t refuse.

— Randi F. Marshall @RandiMarshall

Pencil Point

Pollution solutions

For more cartoons, visit www.newsday.com/nationalcartoons

Quick Points

Testing the limits

• House Speaker Kevin McCarthy said Tuesday the Republican debt limit bill was done and locked and no changes would be made to placate holdouts. Then changes were made late in the night to placate holdouts, some of whom said on Wednesday morning that they were not placated. Almost sounds like Albany.
• Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy had his first wartime phone conversation with Chinese President Xi Jinping, whose country has positioned itself as neutral in the conflict started by Russia. Of course, there is neutral and then the kind of neutral where you also have designs on taking over a smaller neighbor.
• Regarding her failure to get her controversial housing program into the state budget, Gov. Kathy Hochul compared herself to hockey great Wayne Gretzky, recalling his famous line: “You miss 100% of the shots you don’t take.” Then again, Gretzky scored 894 times.
• Supreme Court Chief Justice John G. Roberts declined to testify before the Senate Judiciary Committee on ethics standards for justices, saying such testimony has been “exceedingly rare.” Unfortunately for the court, recent reports of ethical lapses among justices have not been exceedingly rare.
• He was a pioneering singer and actor and the epitome of class, but he will always be remembered for his pivotal place in the civil rights movement at the intersection of celebrity and action. RIP, Harry Belafonte.

— Michael Dobie @mwdobie