Some are for casino, some against, but all in East Windsor brace for change
East Windsor — Kevin Brown had some good news for people here last week. “You’ve arrived,” he announced. That was right before Brown, chairman of the Mohegan Tribe, and Rodney Butler, his Mashantucket Pequot counterpart, signed an agreement spelling out how the tribes’ MMCT Venture would compensate East Windsor for hosting a third Connecticut casino. If the state blesses the project — a sizable if at this point — it would be built on an abandoned site off Interstate 91, which cuts through East Windsor’s northwest corner.
The site’s about an hour from the tribes’ respective southeastern Connecticut casinos, Mohegan Sun and Foxwoods. More important, it’s about 15 minutes from Springfield, Mass., where a competing casino’s taking shape.
Many in town surely agreed with Brown’s assertion.
Indeed, the vast majority of residents who packed the middle school auditorium one night in late January voiced overwhelming support for a casino in their midst. One of the most ardent voices was that of Selectman Steve Dearborn.
“We’re not growing, we’re not going anywhere,” he said. “It’s going to put us on the map.”
But not everyone in town agrees, with some arguing that there should have been a referendum on whether East Windsor should host a casino.
“Should have been a vote,” said Clem Wierkrykas, who was approached as he left the Big Y supermarket on Prospect Hill Road. “I don’t want a casino. We don’t need one.”
Wierkrykas said he’s lived in town for 30 years.
“Everything’s going to change,” he said. “It’s going to wreck my peace and quiet.”
The Big Y’s right near the casino site, now occupied by a vacant Showcase Cinemas that screened its last matinee in 2008. Between the Big Y and the boarded-up movie theater stands a vacant former Wal-Mart store that the chain replaced with a nearby “supercenter” a few years ago.
Not far from the casino site, John Hensley, a Prospect Hill Drive resident, came out onto his porch to field a reporter's questions. A casino opponent, he faulted First Selectman Robert Maynard for forgoing a referendum, theorizing that Maynard must have figured it would fail.
Maynard, who joined the tribal chairmen in signing the casino agreement, has said the casino project meets zoning regulations and therefore no referendum was required.
“There's a hell of a difference between a movie theater and a gambling facility,” Hensley said. “I'm worried that in the future, the town of East Windsor is going to take the revenues from the casino and start expanding government, give the town managers pay raises and then, in five or six years, the casino moves out and leaves the burden for taxpayers . ... The movie theater didn't work out. What if the casino doesn't work out?”
Two of Hensley's neighbors were on opposite sides of the fence.
“I'm in favor of it,” said Roberto Vazquez, who visits Foxwoods several times a year. “I don't think it'll stop people from going to Springfield, though.”
Melissa Downie said she and her boyfriend, a longtime East Windsor resident, were worried about some of the social ills regularly associated with casinos.
“I know they say the crime is low around them, but I don't believe it,” she said. "... We went to the meeting in January and ended up leaving. We knew what we had to say wouldn't make a difference.”
Asked if there should have been a referendum, Downie said, “Absolutely. People should have a voice.”
Denise Kaluna, manager of the Main Street Grille in the heart of the town's Broad Brook section, opposite the Opera House community theater (East Windsor has a strip club, too), thinks the casino just might be salvation.
“Personally, I don't see any issue with it,” she said. “We need jobs. Everybody needs jobs, every town needs jobs.”
A mother of two, Kaluna said the revenue the town would get from the casino — an estimated $8.5 million a year in taxes and “mitigation” payments, according to the agreement — could address many needs. She said the middle school her youngest son, a seventh-grader, attends had to eliminate its music program and the basketball team last year. Her older son opted to attend Cheney Tech in Manchester rather than East Windsor High.
“The library needs books, the schools need supplies,” she said. “If they're going to help our community programs, I'm all for it . ... People are worried about the traffic — well, they'll figure that out.”
Even before they settled on East Windsor, the tribes donated $3,000 to the town youth center's annual fundraiser.
As Maynard, the first selectman, said at the agreement signing, “This project is an amazing opportunity for East Windsor.”
Still, the question of whether there should have been a referendum lingers.
On Friday, the Coalition Against Casino Expansion in Connecticut, an alliance of more than a dozen mostly faith-based groups, announced it would hold a forum in town Monday night to discuss plans for a petition drive calling for a referendum. Former Congressman Bob Steele, a coalition organizer and an active foe of expanded gaming, is to be among the speakers.
In addition, a public hearing on legislation legalizing another casino in the state will be held Thursday in Hartford. While one bill offered by the Public Safety and Security Committee essentially would sanction the tribes' plan for an East Windsor casino, another measure would open up the casino-approval process to competitve bidding.
So, it remains unclear whether East Windsor, in the eyes of some, actually has arrived.
But if it has, “In another 18 months,” John Hensley, the Prospect Hill Drive resident, said, “I'll be seeing some big, bright lights from my bedroom window. Nothing here will be the same.”