Richmond Mayor Levar Stoney and several members of the City Council are proposing a 2-cent reduction to the city’s real estate tax rate to get voters behind a second casino referendum.
After voters narrowly rejected plans for the nearly $600 million One Casino and Resort last November, the Richmond City Council voted Monday night to hold another popular vote on whether to permit the project, again highlighting a projected windfall of $30 million in annual tax revenue, 1,500 jobs and an immediate $25 million payment if the measure passes.
The mayor’s administration announced the tax cut proposal a few hours before the council vote on Monday night. A Stoney spokesman said the tax cut would be contingent on voters approving the project.
“Our residents deserve tax relief and access to good jobs. They want public infrastructure improvements and more funding for school capital projects. This project provides a unique opportunity to do just that,” Stoney said through a news release ahead of the meeting. “I know City Council is committed to creating opportunities that uplift and support all Richmond residents, and I’m hopeful tonight’s vote affirms this shared commitment.”
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The referendum failed last November in a 49% to 51% vote, by a margin of approximately 1,500 votes. Opponents said the result was a victory over a project they suspected would create gambling addiction, poverty, criminal activity and other social issues.
In a public hearing on Monday where about 20 people evenly split on the referendum legislation spoke, community activist Allan-Charles Chipman and others said they felt it would be unfair to try it again.
“The passage of this legislation would defy the expressed will of the people in Richmond. It is a frequent tactic of casinos once they lose any democratic referendum to try and break the will of the people with consecutive referendums,” Chipman said. “While double or nothing is an acceptable tool for someone who lost a bet in the casino, it is not an acceptable option for the members of this body who lost a bet on a casino.”
Stoney and other supporters of the Richmond casino project have noted that the election results broke along racial and geographic lines, according to precinct vote counts that showed majority white precincts voted 2-to-1 against the project, even as voters closest to it in South Richmond, in majority Black neighborhoods, voted overwhelmingly for it. (According to city election officials, 26,000 of the 77,000 votes counted were sent by mail or cast before Election Day, meaning that one-third of all votes were reported from a central location.)
In pitching the project last year, many supporters noted that it would be the only Black-owned casino in the country. In an interview with the Richmond Times-Dispatch last month, Stoney said the rejection made some of the city’s Black residents feel unloved.
Under the legislation passed on Monday, the city would again partner with national media conglomerate Urban One and Peninsula Pacific Entertainment, the owner and operator of Rosie’s gaming emporiums and Colonial Downs racetrack, to deliver a casino resort with 250 hotel rooms and a 3,000-seat concert venue. The development would still be located on property owned by Philip Morris USA near the intersection of Commerce Road and Walmsley Boulevard.
As advertised ahead of last year’s vote, the city would not provide any tax breaks or other incentives for the project.
Alfred Liggins, the CEO of Urban One, also spoke during Monday’s public hearing, saying that many voters last year had told him that they were unaware about how the project would benefit the entire city, citing agreements that were made to provide $16 million for Richmond public schools and charitable organizations.
“We needed to be more intentional and specific about that,” Liggins said. “The idea now that the administration and council is talking about proposing a real estate tax reduction, which will go across all nine council districts ... is a big difference.”
The council was nearly unanimous in voting for a second referendum, with several members supporting the tax cut proposal and challenging allegations that it would be undemocratic. Councilwoman Katherine Jordan, who opposed the referendum last year, voted against it again Monday, citing personal objections to casino gambling.
The council approved the legislation on Monday as state Sen. Joe Morrissey, D-Richmond, is seeking to pass a bill in the Virginia General Assembly that would enable Petersburg to hold its own casino referendum and bar Richmond from holding another casino for the next five years.
State law currently allows Richmond, Danville, Portsmouth, Norfolk and Bristol to permit a casino, if approved by voters. Richmond voters rejected the One Casino plan a year after the other four localities overwhelmingly approved casino plans in their communities.
Morrissey, who had supported the One Casino and Resort project, recently criticized Richmond officials for considering another referendum, calling the idea “undemocratic.”
With two cities competing for the fifth state casino license, Urban One has been quiet on whether it favors one city or the other. The company did not respond to questions sent by email on Monday.
Mark Hubbard, a McGuireWoods consultant who had been a spokesman for Urban One and Peninsula Pacific’s campaign last year, referred questions to 8th District Councilwoman Reva Trammell, the chief sponsor of the referendum legislation.
Trammell said Monday that she was hopeful that it would pass, as she and others have been collecting signatures for a petition drive to bring the referendum back.
Trammell said she was unsure of who is coordinating the petition, but noted that Charles Willis, president of the Richmond Highway Neighborhood Civic Association, had also been gathering signatures. The civic association, which represents the neighborhoods closest to the proposed casino site, endorsed the project last year.
Willis was unavailable for an interview on Monday, but recently highlighted the petition in a series of videos on his personal Facebook page promoting events where he and others with a group called Richmonders for a Better Future have provided free gas for motorists at gas stations in South Richmond.
Clovia Lawrence, a local radio host who works for Urban One, also promoted the events and spoke in favor of the city legislation during Monday’s public hearing. She and Willis did not respond to messages Monday asking who paid for the gas.
According to state campaign finance reports, a campaign committee associated with the casino project paid Willis $2,500 on Dec. 10. The committee reported $2.6 million in campaign expenditures last year, with all of the money coming from the project’s owners or in-kind donations in the form of ads on Urban One’s stations.