ALBANY — Major gambling interests have pumped about $2.4 million into a group run by city business leaders that’s promoting Gov. Cuomo’s agenda — including legalization of casino gambling.
The Committee to Save New York got donations of $400,000 from Genting, which runs the Aqueduct Racetrack racino, and about $2 million from the New York Gaming Association — the umbrella group for all nine of the state’s racetrack-based electronic gaming halls, sources confirmed last night.
Spokesmen for Cuomo and CSNY downplayed any link between Cuomo’s advocacy of casino gambling and the contributions.
Cuomo spokesman Richard Bamberger noted that the governor hired a gambling czar last June and began laying the groundwork for changing the state Constitution to allow Las Vegas-style casinos last August, before the contributions were made.
And just yesterday, Cuomo declared that he is “100 percent opposed” to giving racino operators the exclusive right to develop up to seven commercial casinos — as would be allowed under a plan he and state lawmakers hope to put before voters next November.
Cuomo had proposed granting Genting the right to expand its racino in exchange for the gaming giant building the nation’s largest convention center next to Aqueduct.
The deal fell apart due to uncertainty about the future of casino gambling in New York.
CSNY spokesman Michael McKeon said his group wants “to create jobs, improve the economy of our state and get state government working for the people again.”
“If there are people who felt they were getting something more for contributing to CSNY, then they are simply wrong,” he added.
Cuomo also said that if voters next year approve seven casinos, at least one should be in or close to the city.
He would not rule out Belmont Park or Yonkers Raceway as future sites, although he said that Manhattan would be out of luck, as he restated his opposition to a casino in the borough.