boufa

A few point on issue 3... I am not against aambling, I am not ever going to go a casino, if built, its just not my thing. I will say that casino's are a voluntary tax, in exchange they give you entertainment. If its your thing then fine... not for me. I have spent a few short minutes playing slots in niagara, and did not find it to be much fun... I even came out ahead. Having said all that here are my thought in random bullet points as I think of them... - strange the way the anti 3 crowd is using a devil all over the screen. If they were not church backed, then it would be a huge uproar and lots of complaints. - the anti 3 crowd is using "hair splitting" political tactics to twist the words into whatever order they want. You have to listen closly to the qualifying words to have their sentences be true.. for example, they say that "there will never be 34,000 jobs AT ONE TIME." Well yea, I hope the guy running the electricity and the black jack dealer are not both working at the same time... they don't dispute the number of jobs, they just say it is evil since the perm jobs and the construction workers will not be working at the same time. - another picky political type tactic... they could bring in out of state workers. There are no guarantees for ohio preferential hiring... well there never are. And in a state that is rapidly losing population, if they want to truck in 34,000 new taxpayers, that would be o.k. with me. - the cash gambling issue... the issue states that taxes will be charged whenever someone converts the credits, tokens, chip, or vouchers into regular currency (aka they cash out). There will be no cash betting in a modern casino. The commercial shows someone putting money into a machine. True money goes in, but what comes out... wait, wait... yea chips, or a paper voucher. Nice half truth from them right. - and to the person above who said that the money would simply push out or replace existing funds, and not actually improve anything for the schools... well, i had the same worry. However in the actual text of the issue it says "Provide that tax collection. and distributions to school districts and local governments, under this Amendment, are intended to supplement, not supplant, any funding obligations of the state." You want to talk about half truths and twisted logic. This means that the casino CANNOT develop into a situation where the communities could lower our regular taxes due to the new funding sources. I'll vote for it, because in the end it will not hurt. I also don't care if the developers are making money on the project, good for them. People have to get back to the reality that profit is good. It is why most people get out of bed in the morning.

I have read the actual amendment. It is an interesting read. Some about the issue and some about the developments themselves. To keep it on topic, I will only say that the locations of the casinos are very specifically designated in the wording of the issue. In reality you are not voting to allow casinos in ohio, you are voting to allow casinos on 4 very specific plots (within ohio). That is how the developer is controlling who gets to build the casinos, since they already have contracts/control on the land authorized. Development is a wonderful thing in most cases, and bringing people into an area, any area, will enhance the area. Sometimes in unexpected ways, but the local businesses will adapt.