Is this a glimpse to our future?

With the Prince Rupert Chances Gaming Centre still under construction and set for a September opening, it's of interest to take a look eastward to Prince George, where the Treasure Cove Casino, (the folks who will be operating our Gaming Centre) has just won approval to expand the Prince George facility.

Treasure Cove sought out city council permission in Prince George to increase the number of slots in the Casino and in a new show lounge to be built at the city's entertainment mecca. Suggesting that an increase in the slot numbers and new lounge might increase the number of tourists to the shadow of Mr. PG, owner John Major carried the day winning approval from all but one of Prince George's councillors.

Included Among the benefits touted by the proponents were that:

It will create 30 new jobs adding to the 200 already employed by the Casino

It will create 40 construction jobs and $5 million dollars worth of construction

Increase City’s gaming revenue by $1 million dollars ( approx)

Provide benefits for the Van Bien neighbourhood, through a sound retaining wall, new sound retaining fence, and a landscape berm along Highway 16.

The Opinion 250 website has an extensive look at the proposal and the feedback in the community to the proposal. Treasure Cove, with an additional 175 slots will jump to fifth place in BC as far as available slots machines go with 575 at the Casino.

By comparison the Prince Rupert Gaming centre will have 125 slot machines and 120 electronic bingo positions, so it's not hard to think that the day may come pretty quick where an increase in the number of machines might be desired on the local front. Interestingly enough the number of slot machines seem to have already increased from the early days of the project. In March, this Daily news story suggested that there would be roughly 60-70 slot machines in the Centre, so apparently the business plan has changed slightly since that time.

The article might make for an interesting bit of reading for locals who are on either side of the local gaming centre debate, while the two cities are no longer close in population and in market demographics, there is still some value in learning how the issue is being approached and handled in a different BC city.

You can read up on the subject from this link.