Fighting poverty through gambling? Dems battle over Michigan casinos expansion
Should off reservation Indian casinos expand into Detroit? For Dems, it apparently depends on whose money interests you support. Of course, both sides claim to have the interests of the poor in mind.
Susan Crabtree provides a lengthy and somewhat convoluted report (2.7.2008) in the Hill on the nature of the Democrats dispute, but this is perhaps the most enlightening excerpt:
Seven members of Congress, including three committee chairmen showed up to testify for a House Natural Resources Committee hearing Wednesday aimed at clearing the way for Indian casinos in the Michigan towns of Romulus and Port Huron.
Dingell, a Democratic Party elder statesman and chairman of the Energy and Commerce Committee, and Reps. Bart Stupak (D-Mich.) and Candice Miller (R-Mich.) are pushing hard for the two proposed off-reservation casinos. They argue the areas are economically depressed and desperately need the jobs and revenue the casinos would bring.
But Rep. Carolyn Kilpatrick, a Democrat who represents Detroit and chairs the CBC, is vehemently opposed to the casinos and at least one of their proposed locations, near the Detroit airport.
Kilpatrick is deeply concerned that the Indian casinos would create unfair competition to three existing casinos in Detroit, which provided a crucial influx of $1.3 billion in revenue to the city in 2007. The Detroit casinos are helping the city battle its own economic woes, argued Kilpatrick and her son, Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick. Emotions over the issue can be raw . . . read more