Wynn said it's put is $1.7-billion Everett casino on hold until after state officials rule on environmental objections filed by the city of Somerville.
This includes canceling plans for hiring 4,000 construction workers and a formal April groundbreaking, Wynn says.
The company took no similar actions while fighting the city of Boston's federal lawsuit, which, granted grew increasingly unlikely to succeed the more a judge read Boston's legal pleadings.
On hearing the state gaming commission had approved the $68-million deal between Wynn and Boston, Everett Mayor Carlo DeMaria issued a statement commending both sides. He concluded:
This is literally a win/Wynn outcome for everyone.
Mayor Walsh's office announced tonight that Boston has signed a "Surrounding Community Agreement" that includes $68 million worth of payments to the city over the next 15 years and an effort to spend at least $20 million a year with Boston businesses over the same period.
The agreement marks the end of the city's increasingly futile court challenges to the Wynn casino on a parcel in neighboring Everett. Read more.
The Globe reports a Suffolk Superior Court judge rejected the city's "spurious" claims and that the city, which has already spent some $1 million on the suit, is looking at a possible appeal.
CommonWealth Magazine reports Wynn won't give us the nightclub we desperately deserve because the state's current 2 a.m. closing time just doesn't cut it.
The Globe reports the city of Boston has filed a second lawsuit to try to block the Wynn casino - this time focusing on environmental and Sullivan Square traffic concerns, rather than the alleged corruption angle that was getting laughed out of court.
The Globe tracks down the backer of a proposed ballot question that would allow a slots parlor on land near a racetrack - a guy who bought a mobile-home park near Suffolk Downs, which had insisted it had nothing to do with the proposal.
Late Friday, state Energy and Environmental Affairs Secretary Matthew Beaton signed off on the Wynn casino planned for Everett, removing a major hurdle for the project.
Everett Mayor Carlo DeMaria was all woot woot: Read more.
The convoluted legal maneuverings around the proposed Wynn casino in Everett got more interesting this week when the US Attorney's office denied the city's claims that two former state troopers, working on the side as private eyes for Wynn, got a look at what were supposed to be private documents related to Wynn's purchase of the land from three men now under federal indictment for the way they allegedly tried to hide that one of them was a convicted felon. Read more.
Boston Mayor Marty Walsh today announced the city has expanded its lawsuit against the state Gaming Commission to seek nullification of all its decisions, not just the one allowing a casino in Everett on the Charlestown line, and a court ruling that the present commissioners be disqualified from any future votes on a Boston-area casino. Read more.
In a lawsuit filed today, Boston seeks to have the state's award of a casino license to Wynn for a site in Everett tossed out as illegal, charging the planned Everett casino will be built on a foundation of criminal acts and legal bungling that will destroy efforts to improve Sullivan Square and deny the city its rightful amount of mitigation money.
Massachusetts Lawyers Weekly reports:
A memorandum of law obtained by Lawyers Weekly accuses Wynn Resorts of violating state law by failing to disclose an August letter it received from the IRS’ criminal division before the Massachusetts Gaming Commission awarded Wynn the coveted Boston-area casino license in September.
The Globe reports on Somerville's suit against the state gaming commission, over one of the owners of the land Wynn's casino will go on.
The Globe reports both state and federal grand juries have indicted the three owners of the Everett land on which Steve Wynn recently won approval for his $1.6-billion casino - the two owners listed on records and the third hidden owner with a mob past.
The federal grand jury indicted the three for fraud, the state one for lying to the state gaming commission, the Globe says.
The state Gaming Commission voted today to pick the Wynn proposal for Everett over the Mohegan Sun proposal for Suffolk Downs, with three of the four commissioners saying Wynn's proposal would be better for the area, workers and the environment.
Commission members said Wynn proved it had greater capital to ensure its project could get built and then run through challenging economic times - and would spend more money locally than Mohegan Sun. Also, if Wynn doesn't build, the contaminated, empty site on which it would be built would stay a contaminated, empty site.
The Boston Business Journal updates us on the latest in the Boston-area casino deliberations - the state Gaming Commission could require Wynn to bargain with the city over Sullivan Square traffic issues if Wynn gets the license, but an angry Marty Walsh indicates he might still sue if Wynn wins.
WBUR reports on the decision between Suffolk Downs/Mohegan Sun in Revere and Wynn in Everett - two months before voters decide whether to allow any casinos in the state at all.
The Boston Business Journal reports the Massachusetts chapter of the American Institute of Architects finds the Mohegan Sun proposal for Revere much better on the outside.
Updated with Gaming Commission statement.
MassLive.com reports the state Gaming Commission told Boston that if it's unwilling to go to arbitration with Wynn over compensation for its proposed Everett casino, then it's stripping Boston of its "surrounding community" status.
In a statement this morning, the commission says this does NOT mean Boston will get nothing from Wynn should it be selected for the Boston area's one casino license:
If Wynn gets the state's casino license for greater Boston, it says it will pay a local clean-water group to "seed" the Mystic's mouth with up to 250,000 oysters as a natural water-filtration system that could also help re-establish an estuary ecosystem there.
The Massachusetts Oyster Project has been working to bring oysters back to the waters of Boston Harbor because the bivalve's natural feeding habits - basically opening up and letting water flow in - are great at filtering particulates out of the water, some 30 gallons' worth of water a day.
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