Dauphin County Gaming Advisory Board presents its recommendations for the 2012 Local Share Gaming Grants.

Recommendation: Deny.

POSTED BY TARA LEO AUCHEY.

In order to help offset budget woes, this past summer the City of Harrisburg applied for a Dauphin County Local Share Municipal Gaming Grant. Asking for at least $2 million, the City aimed to secure the funds in order to prevent the layoff of public safety officers in 2012. In its application to the Dauphin County Gaming Advisory Board, the City asserted that because of structural deficits, if it did not receive the grant, then 12 police officers and 11 fire fighters would be cut.

The City was one of 76 original applications presented to the Advisory Board. In all, the applicants requested $23 million drawing on a pool of $6-7 million. For five and a half months, the Dauphin County Gaming Advisory Board along with its well-paid consultant Mike Musser collected, reviewed, interviewed, and pondered who should get Gaming Grants.

Per the PA Gaming Act, it?s this advisory board that is in charge of undertaking the process of recommending how the Commissioners should distribute the share of revenue the County receives from Hollywood Casino. The State sets the general parameters for allocating this pool of restricted gaming funds and the Advisory Board sets the criteria. Eligible projects have to fall into at least one of the following categories: Human Services, Infrastructure Improvements, Facilities, Emergency Services, Health, and Public Safety.

While the Advisory Board carries out the process of consideration, ultimately, it?s the Commissioners who decide where the money goes.

Next Wednesday, February 22nd, the 5-member Gaming Advisory Board will present its recommendations to the Commissioners. Yesterday, the 16th, the Board voted on the list it will give them.

As the Mayor has repeatedly declared in accordance with her Act 47 Plan, the City?s intent was to apply every year until 2016 for $2 million annually

Yesterday, after the barely 14-minute Gaming Advisory Board meeting adjourned, attorney Mark Stewart of Eckert Seamans, who is counsel to the Dauphin County Gaming Advisory Board, explained that the City of Harrisburg received such a low score and is not being recommended for funding because its request wasn't really a project, but rather a request to fill a hole in the City's operating budget. The City's application just didn't really fit the definition as outlined in the Act. Gaming grants aren?t supposed to subsidize budgets, Stewart stated.

Photo/Natalie Cake