No zoning restriction translates to no cap on slots at ‘Rocksino’
If council wanted to restrict the number of slot machines at the future “Rocksino,” it probably should have written the number into the land-use rules for the Albion Road property, judging by the trail of municipal decisions on the gaming file.
But a 2013 council vote calling for a maximum of 1,250 slot machines hasn’t been altered and some councillors are on a mission to understand how that jibes with a planned expansion to have 2,000 machines at the Hard Rock casino.
One of those councillors, Rideau-Rockcliffe Coun. Tobi Nussbaum, said “the mystery remains.”
“The letter of Oct. 8, 2013 from the OLG makes clear that the OLG as the regulator of gambling will respect council’s wishes to limit the number of slots at the Rideau Carleton Raceway to 1,250,” Nussbaum said.
“Regardless of whether that number was placed in the city’s zoning bylaw, OLG undertook in that letter to ensure, as the regulator, there would be no more than 1,250 slots. I think the applicant has every right to ask council to expand that number. I’m not at all doubting that there is a legal ability of the applicant to request a change to that number, but until that happens, I take a signed letter from the provincial regulator at its face value.”
The OLG says the city has told the gaming agency that council’s slot cap has been dropped. It doesn’t have a written record of that.
Nussbaum said if that’s true, then he want to know who that was and under what authority was he or she communicating that information.
The city acknowledged on Friday that one of its lawyers spoke with the OLG to confirm that the zoning at the Rideau Carleton Raceway didn’t restrict the number of slot machines.
Tim Marc, a senior lawyer for the city, said in an email that council has never established a bylaw limit on the number of slot machines at the raceway site since slots were first permitted by a province regulation in 1998.
Still, it’s not clear how council’s motion endorsing a maximum of 1,250 slots factored into the decision to allow more of the gaming machines at the facility. Council’s direction on Oct. 9, 2013 was for management to only execute a new revenue-sharing agreement with the OLG if the city received assurances from the OLG that gaming expansion won’t exceed 1,250 slot machines and 21 table games.
Since the table games are embedded in the zoning rules for the property, Hard Rock is able to follow municipal planning processes to request increases.
“OLG respects municipal decision-making,” OLG spokesman Tony Bitonti said in an email Friday.
The request for pre-qualifications of potential operators was the same in each of the gaming “bundles” offered up across the province by the OLG. A theoretical number of slots and tables was cited, reflecting the OLG’s estimate of the potential for market growth, Bitonti said. The OLG used a supply-and-demand model to help determine the number of theoretical number of gaming positions, he said.
When it came to slots, the OLG envisioned up to 2,000 electronic games at the raceway. Hard Rock and the raceway entered into operations under that understanding.
The 1,250-slot maximum endorsed by council might simply have had no teeth.
Nussbaum said he’s looking for answers.
“This is important because this is yet another case of council perhaps not being made aware of the implications of particular actions,” Nussbaum said.