Historical horse racing machines slot machines gambling gaming
Historical horse racing machines at the Rose Gaming Resort in Virginia. (Photo via Wikimedia/Creative Commons)

TO PUT IT in fitting terms, the Legislature’s handling of a potential expansion of gambling in Massachusetts has a less-than-subtle “tell” that signals how they prefer to govern in general: quietly, behind closed doors, and with as little public engagement as possible.

Arguably, no one is more tired of talking about expansion of gaming in Massachusetts than I am. As the co-chair of the group that blocked a Suffolk Downs casino bid in 2013, a proponent of the failed 2014 statewide repeal initiative aimed at ousting gaming altogether, and the chair of the ballot question opposition that blocked an international dark-money-financed bid to expand gaming licensure in Massachusetts in 2016, I was pretty sure that nothing had been left unsaid.

Unfortunately, the Massachusetts House has us back at it as they attempt to override their own carefully crafted casino legislation through a barely public, backroom maneuver.

As a House-Senate conference committee negotiates differences in their respective versions of a sweeping economic development bill, one of the biggest, most tangible stumbling blocks appears to be a provision in the House version that would allow so-called historical horse racing machines at former race tracks – the Suffolk Downs horse track, which straddles the Boston-Revere border, and the former dog racing track in Raynham.

It’s a bad idea on the merits. But beyond that, this proposal to significantly alter state gambling law has gone through none of the public review and debate that all meaningful pieces of legislation should be subjected to, and it should be killed on that important principle alone.

Historical horse racing is roughly defined as machines that allow gamblers to bet on previously run horse races. With that narrow definition, and the image it conjures of some kind of nostalgic niche apparatus, they are not classified as casinos but as track-betting operations. Google a photo of these machines, however, and it’s clear that they look, operate, and function just like slots, with no indication that there is any relationship to racing – save for the statistics on past races embedded somewhere in the coding.

Greenlighting these would be equivalent to giving the holders of track licenses permission to open a slots parlor without a license, without host community agreements, and without the mandated taxes or dividends required by rightful casino and slots licensees.

It not only would cut into licensed gaming action from casinos and slots parlors, 15 to 40 percent of which goes to the state, but would further cannibalize state lottery dividends that return up to 93 percent of revenues to the state economy.

If accepted by the Legislature as written, a prime beneficiary of the amendment would be the Sterling Suffolk Group, which hasn’t held a live horse race at Suffolk Downs since 2019, although they still operate simulcasting there. (They’re already cashing in on millions from the state-mandated Race Horse Development Fund, which is funded by casinos.)

The historical horse race amendment, sponsored by state Rep. Adrian Madaro of East Boston, would be a giveaway to the biggest losers in Massachusetts’s short gaming history – Sterling Suffolk Group lost out to Wynn Resorts in the competition for the Boston region casino license.

The stealthy initiative — which is being championed by House Speaker Mariano, is poised to upset the existing gambling industry, face an outcry from gambling opponents, and possibly legal action from existing licensees and tribal interests – could actually have a much bigger impact on the larger Massachusetts political stage. If this quiet, backdoor change is allowed to casino legislation that underwent rigorous public review at the time of its original passage, it would set a dangerous precedent for untold numbers and types of legislative tweaks going forward.

The Massachusetts casino law gave voters a clear view of how legislation gets done. From its inception and the empaneling of the state gaming commission in 2011, it has been one of the least ambiguous laws in the state. The legislation authorizing casinos provided a road map for developers and opponents alike to engage in the process.

Underscoring that point is the fact that East Boston activists were able to organize and defeat a 2013 referendum on a proposed casino at Suffolk Downs that had the backing of gambling giants Caesar’s Palace and Mohegan Sun. That showed that David could defeat Goliath, and that perhaps the deck wasn’t entirely stacked in favor of deep-pocketed interests.

In sharp contrast to that more open process, which ultimately resulted in the awarding of three casino licenses statewide, the Legislature is taking the current conversation behind closed doors, excluding the public, and hoping to minimize attention. For lawmakers, the biggest takeaway from that earlier history apparently was not that a fair and balanced process makes for good governance. It was that excluding the public from the conversation ensures the outcomes insiders want.

The biggest takeaway from the current House effort isn’t simply that the Legislature will stop at nothing to advance gaming. It’s that the Legislature will stop at nothing to advance the goals of special interests.

The new gambling effort is just the latest example. There are 4,844 lines in the economic development bill. Amendment #386, which would authorize gambling on “historical horse racing,” only takes up a handful of them. If you don’t get worked up over gambling in Massachusetts, or if you’re not concerned about the House attempt to quietly expand its reach in the state, you might take exception to their blatant efforts to divert existing gaming revenues to benefit special interests.

Or you might, like me, wonder what’s in the remaining 3,754 lines of the economic development bill, who will benefit, and how you might be impacted.

Celeste Ribeiro Hewitt was co-chair of No Eastie Casino, the citizen-led ballot question committee that led the opposition to the referendum on a casino at Suffolk Downs, and chair of the Committee for Sustainable and Responsible Economic Development, the ballot question committee opposing the 2016 ballot question to expand gaming licensing in Massachusetts, aimed at siting a slots parlor near Suffolk Downs.