Pawlenty suffers casino setback

05/18/2005

Lacking votes, panel’s hearing postponed

BY PATRICK SWEENEY and BILL SALISBURY
Pioneer Press

Faced with a vote he expected to lose, Gov. Tim Pawlenty on Tuesday backed out of a long-delayed hearing on his proposal for the state to operate two casinos at the Canterbury Park racetrack in Shakopee.

The House Tax Committee hearing was postponed indefinitely at the request of Rep. Bob Gunther, R-Fairmont, who was sponsoring the casino bill for Pawlenty and House Republican leaders.

Dan McElroy, Pawlenty’s chief of staff, said the decision reflected the latest nose-count of committee members.

“We lost a couple of votes over the last 24 hours and no longer have enough votes to pass the bill today,” McElroy said. “However, I want to make very clear that the legislative process is an ongoing one, and we will continue to work on this idea.”

One casino opponent said the latest cancellation of a Tax Committee vote, which followed similar delays last week and Monday, signaled the end of Pawlenty’s casino push.

“It’s dead, it’s been dead for weeks,” House Minority Leader Matt Entenza said of the bill.

But McElroy said he and Pawlenty might try to bypass the Tax Committee to get the legislation to a House floor vote.

Canceling the hearing — especially when McElroy so explicitly acknowledged it was because support for the gambling plan was eroding — is a major blow to Pawlenty’s plan for the Minnesota Lottery to get into the business of casino gaming.

But the action does not mean the issue of casino gambling will not resurface, either before the end of the legislative session Monday or during a likely special session. “Nothing is over,” McElroy said.

McElroy also made one point clear: Pawlenty does not want to give up on his proposed partnership with the White Earth Band of Ojibwe.

Pawlenty’s latest gambling proposal, which he was counting on to produce $200 million for his state budget, called for the state Lottery to enter into two partnerships — one with the owners of Canterbury Park, and one with the White Earth tribe. The plan called for each partnership to build and operate a casino a couple of hundred yards apart at the racetrack.

Some House Republicans support a rival, Canterbury-only bill that called for the Lottery to operate a “racino” at the race track

But McElroy said Pawlenty opposes any casino plan that does not benefit White Earth and perhaps other tribes.

Rep. Ray Vandeveer, R-Forest Lake, a gambling opponent and Tax Committee member, said he had been prepared to vote for Pawlenty’s two-casino Canterbury plan Tuesday in return for a guarantee from Pawlenty that casino gaming would not expand beyond Canterbury in the future.

“The governor was extremely receptive,” said Vandeveer, who wants to prevent a casino from being built at a harness track planned near Forest Lake.