Casino-Free News: January 2008

We need your help immediately.

The front page of the Metro headlines: "Rendell calls council gutless over casinos." In the article, Rendell calls our elected officials gutless and says they are "extorted by community groups."

Extorted by community groups? Give us break. We call it democracy, Rendell.

It is not gutless to take leadership from the people. It does take guts to stand up to casino money. Rendell has his priorities screwed up.

We are asking him to retract his statements. Democracy is beautiful thing. Casinos are not.

SIGN THE PETITION

He is resorting to name-calling and fluffing numbers to defend a policy that only benefits his rich donors. He claims thousands of jobs - but the only jobs assured are those for his friends. The longshoremen's union, small businesses, and citizens have said more jobs will be lost and threatened. At stake is quality long-term planning which is antithetical to casinos versus plastering big boxes with a dose of wishful thinking.

We have previously asked Rendell for his research. As best as we can tell, all his numbers come directly from the casino lobbyists and their "research".

Rendell: it's time for you to show your cards. Instead of name-calling, let's have an open, transparent debate.

Thursday afternoon we had a major victory when Mayor Nutter dealt a blow to SugarHouse by revoking the riparian land rights that were issued "based on certain fundamental errors" in the final days of the Street Administration. We have been urging Mayor Nutter to call for an assessment of what type of development we want in our city. Here is what our new Mayor said on Thursday: "There is very little experience across the country with a development of this kind [in a city of this size]… A legitimate review will ask 'What are the real costs? What are the real benefits?'"

Check out the Plan Philly Article and the 51574 [at] kyw [dot] dayport [dot] com"target="_blank">CBS 3 Clip from the 6:00 PM news from Thursday night.

Last Saturday fifteen Casino-Free supporters traveled out to Gladwyne to the neighborhood of Foxwoods investor Ron Rubin. We had a great time and were well received by neighbors who recognize that casinos in Philadelphia would be bad for the entire region.

Photos © Jacques-Jean Tiziou / www.jjtiziou.net

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