Penn National Awarded Massachusetts Slots Licence

Last Friday the Massachusetts Gaming Commission officially awarded a slots casino license for the Plainridge Racecourse in Plainville.

The Penn National casino company now has a month to pay the $25 million license fee. However, at such a high price the license could turn out to be a very costly mistake for Penn National. At present there is a proposed ballot question to roll back Massachusetts’ casino law, if it is voted for then a gambling license would be useless.

Steve Crosby, the Gaming Commission chair, said that he’s spoken to lawmakers about this possibility and said that the Commission thinks “it would be reasonable to have some mechanism for paying that back in the event that there were a repeal, but that’s not really within our control.”

Despite the risk the CEO of Penn National, Tim Wilmott, said that construction of the slots parlor will begin this week. In a statement Wilmott said, “If there is a ballot question in November, we’re going to fight for the right outcome. We have a lot of experience in political battles with gaming in other parts of the United States and we feel confident we’re going to get the right outcome.”