Chewing over the idea of a casino
The Fed dinner table is usually not the place to stage a debate. But on the subject of a proposed casino in downtown Toronto, I am officially undecided.
So instead of getting an earful from an opponent or a proponent, I sought to be swayed. I found two articulate voices in urban designer Ken Greenberg (an anti-casino advocate), and restaurateur Mark McEwan, who intends to open a restaurant within MGM’s integrated resort (the pro-casino lobby avoids using the c-word).
Greenberg and his wife don’t eat red meat. McEwan’s assistant had told me that he enjoys a simple meal of roast chicken with vegetables. Over the phone, the chef expresses only a preference for sweet peas, adding, “I hope Ken doesn’t spoil my appetite.”
Also invited is Maclean’s columnist Jesse Brown, who like me is ambivalent about a casino.
I settle on fried chicken with a salad of potatoes, brussels sprouts and pickled cauliflower. It has been my experience that chefs don’t want to eat fussy food in their downtime. I’d rather make something that can be slapped on the plate at the last minute. Also, forcing people to eat with their hands cuts through a lot of formality. The McEwan who arrives at my home in a grey cardigan, with a bottle of Brunello, is a little friendlier. Though it is two hours before he shows a hint of a smile.
Over the first course, they talk about the 1960s, the problem with kids these days, and generally agree on the greatness of Toronto as a livable, profitable city.
Once we move on to casino talk, the agreement ends. “I think blowing up the CNE and starting over is a beautiful idea,” says McEwan. “Because it’s a piece of junk.”
On his general disdain for the lakeshore area’s current use, I’m in agreement. The exploitation of problem gamblers is an often-cited concern. Greenberg doesn’t like it when I dismiss that, under the umbrella of libertarianism.
“How do you square libertarianism with the fact that that’s the provincial government of Ontario? And they’re doing it as a form of taxation? Why tax the vulnerable, the poor?” He quotes estimates that 35 per cent of casino revenue comes from problem gamblers.
My great-grandfather was a gambler. In 1903, finding routine village-burnings and Jew-slayings bad for his health, he came here from a small town in Ukraine. He worked hard, built a business, started a family, disappeared for long periods on gambling binges, lost the business in a game of cards and left his family with nothing, kneecapping their chances for prosperity. So I’m not unmoved by the ill fortune that gambling can bring to a community. But I don’t think it’s the government’s role to keep us from our potentially destructive vices, be they drugs, prostitution or gambling. On the other hand, nor does it seem right to monopolistically hand over Boardwalk and Park Place to private enterprise. Greenberg, who has worked in city planning from Mississippi to Boston, describes Sugarhouse, a Philadelphia casino in which the poor and elderly play slots, surrounded by acres of parking. “Probably about a fifth of the size they’re talking about for Toronto,” he says, referring to the Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corporation’s desire for 5,000 slot machines. “That has nothing to do with what they’re proposing for Toronto,” says McEwan, Top Chef Canada judge, operator of many luxurious and well-respected restaurants. “If you look at what’s proposed, from the waterfront up, all of it together, with the convention facilities, with Cirque du Soleil, with Live Nation, it could be a very different place.” “I want something sophisticated,” McEwan says. “I believe there are a lot of layers. It’s not just a casino. If it was Niagara Falls, I would say no.” I’ve been fighting a cold for two days. My mind and body are fuzzy. If you are not friends with Jesse Brown, I highly recommend it, so he can ask questions at your dinners, such as, “What is the casino — or mixed integrated facility — that you would compare it to, that’s somewhere else?” “I think it’s going to be completely unique,” says McEwan. This is where my benefit of the doubt goes out the window. In all casinos, from sawdust joints to black-tie palaces, it strains credulity that MGM will build something so special in Toronto there is nothing to which it can be compared. Whatever it is, my only serious concern is traffic. “To do something that is totally automobile dependent in a place where we’re struggling so desperately with our transportation, is so counterproductive,” Greenberg says. They estimate that from the 5,000 slot machines, there needs to be 13 1⁄ turnovers of cars, per day,
2 for each slot machine. In an area that is already congested.
“Would it be any different than a hockey game?” asks McEwan.
“It operates 24 hours a day, 7 days a week,” answers Greenberg.
With council scheduled to vote on this issue in early May, and a nearmajority of councillors already announcing their opposition, Toronto’s casino seems stillborn.
But that just potentially kicks the debate up or down the road, as a 2014 municipal election issue, or a possibility for the city of Vaughan.
“It doesn’t appeal to me all that much,” says McEwan at the prospect of opening a restaurant in a Vaughan casino, or integrated resort. “It’s going to kill Woodbine. That’s one side effect.”
“But does that concern you?” I ask. He pauses, long enough for me to recall and count the number of times a smile has creased his granite face all night. “I would hate to see the city miss out on the potential for revenue and the potential for development.”
City hall would have us believe there are only two types of people, lefty loonies and heartless conservatives. If it’s possible to be a third type, I’m the one who has no objection to casinos, just this casino. mintz.corey@gmail.com