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john holmes · Posted: Fri May 09, 2008 1:30 pm Post subject: Moncton gets NB's only casino

http://timestranscript.canadaeast.com/front/article/291513

N.B. casino will top Halifax

Finance minister says Moncton casino will be 'bigger and more elaborate'
Times & Transcript Staff

Finance Minister Victor Boudreau can't get into any of the specifics of the plans for a casino in Moncton until an agreement with proponent Sonco Gaming New Brunswick Ltd. is signed.

But he did let one thing slip.

"It will really be a destination casino complex, much bigger and more elaborate than what is in Halifax, for example," he says.

Boudreau says cabinet was able to get a glimpse of the casino design yesterday morning and says Monctonians will definitely like it.

"From what I've seen, I certainly think it is something that is going to fit in well," he says. "It is a very nice design."

Boudreau says they now have two months to sign the service provider agreement with Sonco, but hopes it will happen sooner rather than later.

"We want them to start and they want to get started," he says, adding that once the agreement is signed, all of the details of the project will be released.

"There are other components of this proposal in terms of New Brunswick content and some other pretty interesting things for the province and the Moncton area that we'll be able to release," he says, giving Monctonians a tease of potentially better things to come.

Although Boudreau would not reveal the exact site in Magnetic Hill, insiders say the likely location is a 70-acre piece of land on Charles Lutes Road at Mountain Road.

No building permits have yet been issued for the development.

Greg Neate, general manager of the Magnetic Hill Golf Club, says the addition of a casino in his end of the city can only mean good things for the club.

"The more traffic and the more hospitality we can offer in the north end, the better for the golf course," he says, already envisioning a partnership with the casino that could see green fees traded for loyalty points awarded to frequent customers or other such arrangements.

Neate says the casino will just be one more draw to an area of the city that already has plenty of family-oriented activities and accommodations, making it a perfect vacation destination.

Mark Jelley, general manager of Magic Mountain, doesn't expect the casino will have a positive impact on his business.

"Our customers are families at Magic Mountain, we provide a place for families to come together and have fun and we believe that casinos bring a different target market, they're not bringing in families, it's not the same market, not the same focus," he says. "We don't see it as a complementary business."

On the other hand, Jelley doesn't expect the development to have a negative impact, though he says that may depend on the actual location of the casino and its effect on traffic patterns.

The casino complex will include a convention centre facility that will be able to seat 1,500 people in a theatre setting or 1,400 banquet-style.

Moncton has been trying to get a convention centre built in its downtown for years now. Boudreau says it will be up to the city to decide if it still needs the downtown convention centre space. Another major project that has been discussed for the downtown is a replacement for the aging Moncton Coliseum.

"Maybe that is something that can be looked at as a substitute or maybe at the end of the day the city will feel a downtown convention centre is still justifiable," Boudreau says. "The province will continue to work with the city as we've always done in helping them move forward with their priorities."

Boudreau says the province had no preference for downtown Moncton versus the outskirts of Moncton or vice versa.

The request for proposals did not specify any area of the province in order to allow the market to determine the best location.

"Having received four proposals all in the Moncton-Dieppe area, it was a pretty clear indication that southeastern New Brunswick was the place to be," Boudreau says. "We didn't look at uptown versus downtown, we had a series of criteria that were applied to all four proposals."

In other words, location wasn't the main deciding factor, the quality of the proposal was.