By Steve Norton
CEO, Norton Management

Georgia Senate Creates Committee to Study Gambling

My comment:

Georgia should look at the economic benefits that a destination casino, like the Las Vegas Venetian, could do for Atlanta's existing near 100,000 room hotel industry which is a city also enjoying the benefits of having the world's busiest airport. The addition of a destination casino resort, with its showrooms and lounge entertainment, plus meeting and exhibit space, would grow the number of conventions and trade shows coming to Atlanta but would also add more exhibitors and attendees to the existing and planned conferences.

On the Las Vegas Strip, the casino department is now more of an amenity than a profit center. Sixty-six percent of the earnings from the 24 larger Strip casino resorts come from the rooms department, food and beverage, entertainment, banquets and meeting/exhibit space rentals. Only 34 percent come from casino operations. That's not true in other casino resorts, like Biloxi or Atlantic City, where in AC, the casino department still produces over 90 percent of the resort’s profits.

But AC has no commercial air service, except flights that take South Jersey and Philadelphia residents on bargain flights to Florida or the Caribbean.

A major casino attraction in Downtown Atlanta would bring millions of tourists along with millions of new attendees to area conventions and other events which would benefit area restaurants, entertainment, Atlanta's zoo and aquarium, the city's sports stadiums, and arenas, and would provide upwards of 10 thousand new jobs. But best of all, casino gaming would provide hundreds of millions of dollars of new tax revenue, annually, to support the Hope Scholarship program.