After months of negotiations with city government, the Horseshoe Casino Baltimore and French company Veolia have agreed to contribute a combined $1.5 million to the cost of relocating a steam pipe near the casino – reducing the amount of community impact funds the city is diverting for the project, city officials said.
"I was very pleased to see the contributions," said State Sen. Bill Ferguson, who chairs the Baltimore Casino Local Development Council, which recommends how the city should use community impact funds generated by the casino. "The mayor made a commitment that she would continue negotiating to find additional revenue. I think she kept her word."
Neither company immediately responded to a request for comment.
Controversy flared in August when the city's Board of Estimates diverted $3 million in anticipated community-impact funds to replace a major artery in the city's underground steam pipe system. City officials said the pipe, which is used by Veolia but owned by the city, needed to be relocated in order for the casino to open later that month.
The decision drew criticism from local elected officials and community leaders who said it was a misuse of the funds to be generated by the casino. They wanted the money to be used for neighborhood-oriented projects, such as efforts to connect unemployed residents with jobs.
But city officials said they continued to negotiate with the companies, both of which benefitted from the pipe's relocation. After construction crews relocated the pipe – and the cost of the work rose from $3 million to $4.3 million – casino officials agreed to chip in $1 million for the project, and Veolia pledged $500,000, according to Colin Tarbert, Baltimore's deputy mayor for economic development. The city-owned Baltimore Development Corporation will also chip in more than $400,000, he said.
The contributions reduce the money diverted from the community impact funds to $2.4 million from $3 million.
"I'm happy that others are pitching in," said Keisha Allen, president of the Westport Community Association. Westport is located close enough to the casino to be eligible for local impact funds.
Allen said her preference is still that no community impact funds be used, but she said she sees the contributions as an improvement. "The surrounding communities are in desperate need of help. The excess funds will help us make the communities healthy and stronger," she said.
Allen said she's eager to discuss with members of the casino's Local Development Council where the nearly $600,000 in additional money will go.
The Baltimore casino is expected to generate up to $15 million a year in local impact funds from slot machine profits, including $7 million in first year.
The funds, which were presented as a benefit when voters were asked to approve casino gambling, can be used for nearly any public service or improvement. Under state law, 5.5 percent of slots profits must go to the so-called "community impact grants."
Members of the Baltimore Casino Local Development Council, formed to help City Hall determine how to spend the grants, have asked for the money to be used on additional police, security cameras, neighborhood cleanups, and an employment center, among other items.
The city's steam lines are used to heat downtown office buildings and hospitals. About 240 buildings — mostly large workplaces such as the University of Maryland campus — use the steam for heating radiators, cleaning laundry and sterilizing equipment.
The line in question ran under the main pedestrian and vehicle entrance to the Horseshoe Casino, and city officials worried it would break under pressure from the increased traffic.
Caesars Entertainment-affiliated developers that built the Horseshoe Casino relocated the line, leased by French transnational corporation Veolia, using Baltimore-based contractor Whiting-Turner, according to city documents. The 45-year-old line ran under Warner Street from a plant in the Camden-Carroll Industrial Area to downtown.
Since opening in August, the Horseshoe Casino Baltimore has generated more than $40 million for the state's public schools, more than $5 million for the horse-racing industry, nearly $4 million in community impact funds, and more than $1 million for small and minority-owned businesses, according to state officials.
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