In the end, it was all about the money. In return for an extra $400,000 per year for the next 15 years, plus reimbursement of $750,000 in legal 
fees, Boston Mayor Martin Walsh dropped his efforts to block Wynn Everett. “We fought the good fight, but at the end of the day, the judge dismissed our lawsuit,” Walsh said, bowing to the will of the courts. He also tried to palliate casino adversaries in the Charlestown area by pointing out that they’d benefit from traffic improvements in Sullivan Square and Wynn-funded spending on civic programs.
An additional win for Wynn was the abandonment of a potential fine of $20 million if casino-area traffic exceeds a prescribed level. Under the new regimen, Wynn Resorts will have to take measures like recalibrating traffic lights — certainly a preferable outcome. The lovefest even extended to talk of a Wynn-funded park taking the place of an adjacent sludge-processing plant. Walsh, too, came 
out of the accord with enhanced prestige, chalking up the early ruction with Wynn to mayoral experience. He’s crediting with breaking the ice in negotiations by banishing lawyers from the conference room and talking to Steve Wynn, one Bostonian to another.
Now that Wynn and Walsh have buried the hatchet, there are “george” deals in place for Boston, for Everett ($30 million now, $25 million a year when the casino opens) and for Massachusetts, which can look forward to 25% tax revenue from what is sure to be a very robust casino. And, in the general spirit of forgiveness, S&G promises never to refer to Walsh as Mayor McCheese again.
* Remember the Lucky Dragon? Well, despite having been denied tax-increment financing from the City of Las Vegas (where a casino hardly needs a subsidy), work is progressing at the site, where the hotel tower is almost completely clad. As far as the $30 million shortfall in the $373 million budget, it looks like owner Andrew Fonfa and CEO William Weidner will have to go back to their original source of seed money: EB-5 visas.
* Station Casinos continues to have a yes-no-maybe attitude toward IPOs. Citing “market conditions,” Deutsche Bank — minority owner of Station — told Reuters the IPO was off for now. The company still has until next month to meet its publicly stated goal of launching the offering before its 4Q15 results are stated. Unless the company’s steadily upward revenue and cash flow trends were hobbled last quarter, one doesn’t see the importance of placing the IPO cart before the earnings horse.
Continuing to separate itself from the competition in Atlantic City, the Borgata will invest the better part of $50 million in a new “Roman pool,” along with other enhancements. Amenities at the pool are described as “more than 400 chaise lounges, daybeds and cabanas to go with a full-service canopied bar, an entertainment stage to replace the Festival Park venue and several lawn games.” On top of that and a new restaurant, plus 25,000 square feet of concert space, Boyd Gaming and MGM Resorts International have committed themselves to $12.5 million in annual maintenance of the property. The gauntlet having been thrown down, which competing property will answer the challenge?
