"It has been a long journey, and there is still much to be done. But for the first time in many years there is light and there is hope at the end of this journey.

That's because this Nov. 7 Rhode Islanders will finally be able to cast their vote on a Narragansett Indian casino: an unprecedented $1 billion economic-development initiative that is about so much more than a casino.

It is about the most competitive, publicly scrutinized economic-development project in Rhode Island history -- a rarity in the Ocean State, because it does not seek or require one penny of taxpayer funding to be built.

It is about 3,500 construction jobs for Rhode Island tradesmen and -women. It is about job preference for Rhode Island residents for more than 3,800 resort-casino jobs -- jobs that pay, on average, $47,000 a year, including health benefits. It is about property-tax relief: $144 million to be split among Rhode Island's 39 cities and towns.

It is about recapturing the $322.5 million that Rhode Islanders annually spend at Foxwoods and Mohegan Sun. And that's not counting the millions of dollars more that Rhode Islanders spend each year in southeastern Connecticut's non-casino hotels, restaurants, and retail outlets."

Get the Story:
Narragansett Chief Sachem Matthew Thomas: Let us compete with Connecticut (The Providence Journal 7/30)
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