Casinos reopen with crowds
The lights and sounds — and the sight of more than 10 people inside — jar the senses as you step off the elevator onto the main gaming floor at Foxwoods Resort Casino.
As visotors’ eyes adjusted to a view unseen in nearly three months, the differences were obvious. Everyone wore a mask — likely an advantage for those with a poor poker face — and plexiglass divided groups that didn’t arrive together.
In the long rows of video slot machines, every other one was still dark, and silent.
Still, those restrictions and the LED signs on the highways leading to both Foxwoods and Mohegan Sun that said “Don’t gamble with your health, avoid large crowds,” did not deter thousands of people of all ages from visiting Monday.
“We honestly didn’t know what to expect,” said Rodney Butler, chairman of the Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Council, which owns Foxwoods Resort Casino. “But it’s going well.”
Butler’s excitement was evident as he meandered through the open portion of the casino. He stopped frequently to say hi — usually accompanied by an elbow bump — with people he hadn’t seen in a while, and he was never too busy to help a guest locate an ATM or a bathroom or anything else they might need.
After months of silent machines, dimmed lights and empty corridors, Butler was just happy to see customers enjoying the casino alive again.
“People are looking for ways to entertain themselves,” he said.
Elma Velderema, a health care worker from Putnam, was one among those who couldn’t wait to return to Foxwoods. A weekly visitor before the pandemic with her friend and coworker, Donna Desilets, Velderema is already planning another trip to the casino on Saturday.
She likes to play the slots while Desilets prefers to shop at the Tanger Outlets. Of course, most of the stores aren’t yet open, though the mall itself is.
“This is different for sure,” Velderema said. “We feel totally safe. Everything is spaced out, it’s explained everywhere. There’s not too many people.”
Desilets interrupted to note, “We work in nursing homes, and we were in the Philippines in November, and China for a day, and we’re definitely safe here.”
Both casinos opened their doors early to alleviate lines, and people were there, waiting to get in, at 7 a.m. Butler and Jeff Hamilton, the president and general manager of Mohegan Sun, said there were no problems to report as of Monday afternoon, several hours after opening for both casinos.
The casinos had been closed since early March in response to the coronavirus pandemic. It was the first time in either casino’s history — 1992 for Foxwoods, four years later for Mohegan Sun — that the doors closed.
But expenses didn’t stop, Butler, noted.
“You can’t just totally shut everything down. It’s all mechanical,” Butler said, noting a waterfall that continues to run in a portion of the casino that’s not yet open to the public. He said the casino’s weekly operating expenses amounted to $5 million per week during the closure, counting employee expenses.
Hamilton didn’t provide a dollar amount, but said the financial burden during the shutdown has been significant.
Butler said with only a small portion of the casino open — about 10 percent of the total capacity — the casino might break even on a given week, but that won’t make up for losing a couple million dollars every week the casino was closed.
Hamilton decided to open up most of the floor space at Mohegan Sun to help people spread out more, though most stores and restaurants still remain closed.
One employee at Mohegan Sun who asked not to be named said he still wasn’t comfortable being back at work, but felt he didn’t have a choice.
And Gov. Ned Lamont again reiterated his view that the casinos opened too soon.
“I wanted to be fairly strict on a number of things,” Lamont said during an afternoon briefing at the State Capitol. “We have an advisory out that is clear. People over the age of 65 should not be in large congregate settings. We think it is dangerous even now. We put electronic billboards up saying over 65 ‘don’t gamble with your health,’ and it’s not just your health. It’s the health of everybody you live with as well. We tried to put some good strong advice in place as people are on their way to taking a gamble.”