No smoking or drinking as Atlantic City casinos open
ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. — Atlantic City tried Prohibition once before. It worked so well that Nucky Johnson, the legendary politician and racketeer, built a Boardwalk empire immortalized on HBO nearly a century later.
It also tried banning smoking, too. That lasted for 20 days as smokers stayed away, sending casino revenue plummeting.
But New Jersey will ban both — again — when Atlantic City’s nine casinos reopen after more than three months of coronavirus-related shutdowns.
The late-night announcements from Gov. Phil Murphy landed like a one-two punch on Atlantic City’s casino industry, already reeling from lost revenue during the pandemic, and making plans to creak back to life at the state-mandated 25% of normal capacity.
“No booze? No one’s coming,” said Bob McDevitt, president of a casino employees union. “I really don’t even think they should open. Why would they?”
Many casinos had planned to reopen Thursday, the first day the state will let them. But that was before they knew they could not let their customers smoke, drink alcohol or anything else, or eat inside the casinos.
The top-performing casino, the Borgata, almost immediately folded what it saw as a losing hand, announcing it was scrapping its reopening plans for the immediate future. Instead, it will wait until conditions are more favorable.
On Tuesday, casino executives huddled in staff meetings, looking for more information and trying to decide whether it made sense to reopen at all.
By mid-afternoon, all except the Borgata announced plans to reopen in the coming days. Resorts, Tropicana, Ocean, Golden Nugget and Hard Rock all said they will reopen Thursday. Harrah’s, Caesars and Bally’s will reopen Friday.
Borgata had no estimate of when it might reopen.
Jim Allen, president of Hard Rock International, said the company and its thousands of workers are eager to reopen and start making up for some of the losses they have experienced since March.
“People are really desperate for a job and a paycheck,” he said.
Murphy said Tuesday that casinos will just have to endure a new reality until conditions improve.
“It’s not a life sentence,” he said. “We would like to be full-bore open; we’re just not there yet.”
Before the pandemic, Atlantic City had started to regain its groove, reclaiming its former spot at the nation’s No. 2 gambling market behind Nevada in terms of annual gambling revenue.
Nevada casinos reopened nearly a month earlier than those in New Jersey, with many of the same health protocols: temperature checks for guests and workers, mandated masks after being optional for a time, and hand sanitizer stations.
Smoking was still allowed.