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Prince George'southward gaming foes press their instance

Prince George'due south County Executive Rushern Baker Iii wants to expand gaming to National Harbor in Oxon Hill. Baker has said he'd similar to make the waterfront resort a high-terminate gambling destination. (Linda Davidson/The Washington Mail service)

A coalition of religious and civic leaders in Prince George's County made a new effort Friday to persuade state officials and County Executive Rushern Fifty. Bakery Three (D) to abandon efforts to get gaming expansion on the Nov ballot.

"The greatest bear on will be felt by the poorest of the poor," said Douglas Edwards, a Prince George'due south government minister who said he formerly was addicted to gambling.

"People volition go off of work with their smalls checks and the outset identify they volition head is the casino," Edwards, of Mission of Dear Outreach Ministries, said at a news conference Fri outside the canton's government headquarters in Upper Marlboro.

Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley (D) has been attempting to resurrect a work-group proposal that included a casino in Prince George's, nigh likely at National Harbor, and authorization of tabular array games at Maryland'south existing five slots sites. The program was abandoned last calendar month after three House of Delegates members on the piece of work group withheld their support.

Baker, who has been struggling to discover ways to aggrandize the county'south revenue enhancement base, has been pushing for a sixth Maryland gambling site with a Las Vegas-style casino at National Harbor. To become electric current gaming operators to concur to more competition, political leaders have discussed cutting casino operators' taxes. Next calendar week, O'Malley is expected to announce whether he will call the General Assembly back for a special session to consider putting a gaming plebiscite on the November ballot.

Onetime consul Gerron Levi (D-Prince George'south), among four candidates who ran against Bakery in 2010 for county executive, urged legislators to cold-shoulder a special session. She said any tax cutting for casino operators would amount to "tax cuts for millionaires and mobsters."

Levi said the county's image, which information technology has been working to repair since Canton Executive Jack B. Johnson (D) went to prison this twelvemonth on blackmail and corruption charges, would suffer.

"I am disappointed that National Harbor has gone from Disney," which dropped plans to locate a resort hotel at National Harbor, "to the mob," Levi said. "And the county has gone from trying to recover from a public corruption scandal and locking up elected officials to embracing a corporation that has ties to the Chinese mafia. Why do nosotros want that hither in Prince George's County? I do not believe that our canton executive or other state lawmakers have done sufficient due diligence on MGM," which is vying to operate the proposed casino in Prince George's.

"We don't want that here in Prince George's," she said

She said she is also concerned nearly tax equity.

"It is fundamentally confronting our Autonomous values to deliver a tax cut to the 1 percentage" in a year when the legislature raised other taxes paid by almost Maryland residents and businesses. .

Delman Coates, minister at Mount Ennon Baptist Church in Clinton, has argued for months that Prince Georgians are being asked to build a casino when other, more affluent jurisdictions in the Washington area take refused.

"Prince Georgians seek employment opportunities, economic evolution, and a quality of life that is commensurate with the opportunities provided for our neighbors in the region," Coates said. "What concerns me is that a plan that would be unacceptable to residents in Montgomery and Fairfax counties is being forced upon Prince George's Canton. If it is non proficient plenty for them, why should it exist acceptable to united states of america here?" he said in a electronic mail.