Detroit celebrates regional benefits of competition as one of 3 permanent downtown casinos opens for business

They’ve got the right idea in the Motor City, where they celebrated last week’s opening of the new, $800 million MGM Grand Detroit resort, hotel and casino complex with celebrities, fireworks and a black-tie gala. The ritzy affair marked more than the opening of a new business – it marked a new era in competitive gaming that officials say will create thousands of jobs, provide major fiscal benefits and help put Detroit on the map as a regional entertainment destination.

The MGM Grand Detroit competes with two other downtown casinos, the MotorCity Casino and Greektown Casino. All three started out as temporary facilities – and despite heavy competition, they thrived. MotorCity casino opened its permanent gaming space in June and will debut a 17-story, 400-room hotel in November. Greektown plans to open a major casino and hotel complex in October 2008.

Here’s the kicker: All three of these multimillion-dollar, large scale entertainment centers are within five miles of each other. Five miles!

Casino competition has been good for these businesses, for Detroit, and for the State of Michigan as a whole. Check out the facts:

• Despite operating within mere miles of each other, all three competing Detroit casinos reported revenue increases in January 2007, according to the Detroit Free Press. According to the newspaper, MotorCity reported a 7.1 percent jump, MGM Grand Detroit reported a 4.5 percent leap and Greektown reported a 2.3 percent rise. In 2006, the three casinos raked in a combined total of $1.3 billion in revenue, a 6.1 percent increase from the previous year.

• The casinos have provided hundreds of millions of dollars in annual revenue for Detroit and the state of Michigan, the Detroit News reports.

• Even with three casinos operating in the City of Detroit (and 20 casinos in Michigan), the Detroit News reported in February that Michigan State Lottery revenues had increased by 38 percent over the last four years – generating an additional $141 million for the state School Aid fund.
  

The Forest County Potawatomi should take notice – multiple studies have shown that two competitive casinos can succeed and thrive in Southeast Wisconsin, bringing the region many of the economic benefits Detroit is realizing through casino competition. (Remember, Detroit has three major casinos within 5 miles!)

Detroit’s competitors even have a better attitude than the monopoly-driven Potawatomi. When Casino Windsor in Canada, just across the river from downtown Detroit, announced a major expansion in 2005, Detroit’s casino operators embraced the additional competition. The Detroit Free Press quoted a Greektown spokesman as saying, “We welcome any good competition,” a Greektown Casino spokesman said. Said a MotorCity spokeswoman: “The addition of more quality hotels, convention space and entertainment options will only prove to be of value to the entire area.” A spokesman for Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick was positive, as well. “It’s good that the city of Windsor is remaining competitive,” he said.

It’s nice to see businesses and a community thriving by embracing competition. We’d love to see it in Wisconsin, as well.

Support competition and its economic benefits for Southeast Wisconsin by signing the online petition.