Life after Revel?

Once safely closed — and rid of those pesky employees — Revel could find itself a valuable commodity again. Salaries really are at the crux of the issue. Current ownership is losing $2 million a week and that “black hole” is keeping potential buyers away. ‘To entice acceptable bids,’ it was necessary to close the casino-hotel. We’ll see if anyone emerges from the undergrowth by Sept. 2, the latest date for the oft-postponed bankruptcy auction.

If Revel management had its druthers, the place would already be closed. However, the state ordered it to stay in operation through the Labor Day weekend. Strange that ownership would be willing to forego such a prime revenue period. Stranger still that the New Jersey Casino Control Commission says it has the authority to keep a casino open a few extra days but not a few extra months, as it recently decreed.

Providentially, Maryland Live! has chosen this moment to make another foray into Atlantic City, looking for casino workers. Offers will be made on the spot to qualified applicants. (It’s sort of like a game show.) In addition to Atlantic City, casino owner Cordish Gaming will be making a trawl of the Philadelphia market, in search of good help.

Other uses for Revel are already being considered, such as reinvention as a corporate headquarters (plus condos). Showboat is also considered highly viable, not just for its popular House of Blues but as a prospective timeshare property. The outlook for Trump Plaza is … not so good. “The land may be worth more than the building that’s on it. With the success of the Walk’s shopping nearby, you might extend that shopping corridor right down to the Boardwalk,” speculates Israel Posner, director of gambling studies at Richard Stockton College. In the meantime, someone has to mow the lawn and keep the lights on, to maintain whatever after-dark mystique Atlantic City possesses.

Of course, if Atlantic City is in the papers, there is corollary news of another north-New Jersey casino proposal. The Meadowlands put its cards on the table, proposing a 2,000-room megaresort. It would be wedged between Met Life Stadium and an a projected shopping mall called American Dream. It’s like Vegas, but with major-league sports.

The casino would share hotel, convention and youth-activity space in a building next to Izod Arena, while the other hotel would be over by the race track. Meadowlands would be sprinkled with new parking garages, holding 20,000 vehicles, and the whole shebang would be connected by a monorail.

Apparently incognizant of Marina Bay Sands or a little place called Macao, hubristic Meadowlands boosters said their proposal would be the most successful casino in the world. (We’ve been hearing a lot of that lately.) Without drinking the Kool-Aid, gaming expert Alan Woinski makes a cogent, pro-Meadowlands argument: “The customer in North Jersey is not going to Atlantic City anymore. They drive 70 minutes to Sands Bethlehem casino or to Yonkers.”

Tioga Downs Chairman Jeffrey Gural has chipped in with a proposal for what might be called a charitable racino at his Meadowlands Sports Complex. He’s willing to tithe 55% of his slot revenues, provided that half of the amount goes to help Atlantic City. He explained, “We have to come up with a plan that helps Atlantic City, and doesn’t put it out of business. That’s in no one’s best interest.”

Amen, brother.