After years of waiting, the fate of Kansas‘ seemingly unwanted fourth casino license, long in abeyance came down to three-and-a-half hours of 
presentations by a trio of rival bidders. The Kansas Lottery Gaming Facilities Review Board will make its choice by June 30 and the Kansas Racing & Gaming Commission must sign off on the selection by July 10. That’s a fast track for a proceeding that has been stuck in bottom gear for as long as one can remember.
The heavy hitter was Phil Ruffin (above), whose $84 million Camptown Casino would be fully funded in cash before construction even begins. Ruffin’s group is so confident that they’re offering to pay the state a $5 million down payment on a projected $13 million in taxes, to be derived from a theoretical $48 million in gambling revenues, with patronage forecast at 2,600 punters a day, two-thirds of them from Missouri. The Ruffins also plan to lean heavily on Treasure Island‘s database of customers from the plains states.
Rival Castle Rock ($145 million) hit back with some highly aggressive revenue projections. However, while its bankers forecast an initial $101 million growing to $120 million in five years, consultant WhiteSand Gaming only prognosticated $83 million to $98 million over the same 
period — not counting non-gambling revenues. “All three of these banks, we sent them our market study, market numbers, and they didn’t question why our numbers were so high, they questioned why it was so low. WhiteSand gave us very conservative numbers, but we wanted to make sure we’d hit the numbers we’ve projected today,” said Rodney Steven II.
These figures translate into $22 million right off the bat and a half-billion over 15 years for the American Casino & Entertainment Properties casino, which would be tied in promotionally with the Stratosphere and other ACEP holdings, not that they’re much to speak of. A World Series of Poker pit stop was also promised. Whether it was jobs, visitors, investment or community investment, ACEP’s mantra was more-more-more. Although the Crawford County Convention & Visitors Bureau questions the viability of the project, casino-licensing boards like to hear large dollar numbers (the bigger the better) thrown around, which would seem to make Castle Rock the frontrunner.
Crawford County supports Kansas Crossing, which would sit at the nexus of U.S. 400 and U.S. 69. “There are 22,000 vehicles that pass 
by that intersection each day, that’s twice the traffic of Camptown according to the Kansas Department of Health & Environment,” said investor Bruce Christenson. Officials of JNB Gaming pointed to prior experience with other Kansas casinos and predicted $43 million in initial revenue. They also offered a 10-year, $4 million commitment to the Crawford County Technical Education Center.
Public comments were pretty evenly split in support of Castle Rock and Kansas Crossing, with no one standing up for Camptown Casino. Sorry, Phil.
* What does Sen. Lindsey Graham (R) know that we don’t? He’s 
shown no urgency about reintroducing his version of “Restoring America’s Wire Act” (what you might call a “RAWA deal”), unlike Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R), who’s beavering away in the House of Representatives. But Sheldon Adelson recently co-chaired a Graham fundraiser. For someone who’s declared war on the big, bad Internet, Graham is taking up arms at a leisurely pace. He and Adelson each has something the other one wants. Is Graham holding his bill hostage until Adelson endorses him or does Adelson’s money trump political horsetrading? It’s a curious game these two play.
* If there “will be some impact. But it will be very minor,” why is Lago casino developer Thomas Wilmot demanding that the State of New York deny a gaming license to pocket-sized, tribally owned Yellow Brick Road Casino, near Syracuse? It sounds like Wilmot’s more scared of competition from Yellow Brick Road’s 441 slots than he’s letting on.
