Between an anti-casino coalition and its audience of about 125 people Monday night, there was no shortage of cautionary tales inside East Windsor High School's auditorium.
The attendees, who heard about an hours' worth of arguments against the creation of a possible third casino in East Windsor, even got a few warnings from their neighbors to the north.
Two Palmer, Mass., residents stood to remind the crowd they prevented Mohegan Sun from expanding gaming into their town in 2013. And they asked the same of East Windsor, now faced with a development agreement by a partnership of the Mohegans and Mashantucket Pequots called MMCT Venture.
"We live in a very quiet little town and they wanted to build this enormous monstrosity of a casino. It would have changed the whole town," Palmer resident Charlotte Burns said before Monday's meeting, a large "CasiNo!" sign propped on her lap.In addition to the potential social impact, like alcohol abuse and gambling addiction, Burns said casinos seem only to exploit the poor without improving the overall economy.
Her thoughts were echoed by the group behind the meeting, The Coalition against Casino Expansion in Connecticut. Member Denise Terry said the operators of Foxwoods and Mohegan Sun have offered East Windsor a bad deal, citing statistics she said MMCT Venture recently provided to lawmakers.
For example, the development agreement with East Windsor calls for $8.5 million in annual payments to the town in the first years of operation.
But the operators have said they expect to generate most of their revenue from residents who live within 19 miles of the casino, Terry said. In order for the operators to generate the estimated $78 million in taxes that will go to the state, Connecticut residents would have to lose about $280 million in gambling, she said.
She also claims the operators have made no promises to hire Connecticut construction workers.
"The result would be to drain money out of north-central Connecticut instead of pumping money in," Terry said. "I doubt that in the 250 years of East Windsor's history as a town there has ever come before the town a more important issue than whether to open a casino." CLICK TITLE TO CONTINUEGenerator on the move
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TORRINGTON – Temporarily delayed Sunday night by a broken valve that caused a hydraulic fluid leak, the giant trailer transporting a massive generator for a power plant in Oxford was on the move again Monday night.
Close to 50 people hung out at the Big Y parking lot on Winsted Road shortly before 9 p.m. to watch the 200-foot yellow monster trailer creep its way onto the road. A crew parked the truck there for repairs after it had stopped just past Kennedy Drive because of the broken valve.
Dina Melanson of New Hartford was one of several spectators recording the event on their smartphones. She was there with her boyfriend, James Blasette, and their young son, James, who was very excited to see the truck.
“It was very interesting,” Melanson said. “It was something we’ve never seen before. It was quite interesting the way they were doing it. It was very well done.”
The generator is the first of six pieces that need to be transported from a National Guard compound in Windsor Locks to Oxford. The turbines and generators are an average of 31 feet long, 14½ feet tall and 13¼ feet wide, weighing between 250 and 300 tons, according to Thomas Rumsey, vice president for external affairs for Competitive Power Ventures, the project developer.
Only one piece can be transported at a time, so each 90-mile trip could take five to seven days, or six to seven weeks before all six pieces get to Oxford, Rumsey said. The truck will be traveling no faster than 3 to 5 mph, roughly a brisk walk to a jog.
The trailer requires a state police escort from the National Guard compound in Windsor Locks to Airport Road in Oxford. Each trip will pass through New Hartford, Winsted, Torrington, Litchfield, Watertown, Woodbury and Southbury before it gets to Oxford.
Construction of the 785-megawatt CPV Towantic power plant began in late November. The plant is expected to be completed by the second quarter of 2018.