From the Northwest Indiana Times:
Lake County officials are as generous with their casino revenues as they have to be.
The county has received more than $265 million since the four riverboats in Gary, Hammond and East Chicago dealt their first hands in 1996.
The Ameristar Casino and Hotel in East Chicago, the Horseshoe Casino in Hammond and the two Majestic Star Hotel and Casinos in Gary have added an assessed value of more than $200 million to the county and until recently employed more than 5,000 people, according to the Indiana Gaming Commission.
But the majority of the gaming revenues listed as being distributed to Lake County government doesn't stay local as the state skims more than half off the top.
Porter County doesn't host a casino. Its voters disapproved of the gaming operations in a 1993 referendum.
And LaPorte County is home only to Blue Chip Casino, which has pumped more than $189 million into Michigan City and the rest of that county's local government coffers since 1996.
Dividing it up
Lake county government was in line to receive $17.6 million in riverboat taxes this year alone.
But state law mandates almost $4.4 million of that will be distributed to more than 29,000 Lake County residents in the form of checks of up to $300 under the Lake County Residential Property Tax Credit law.
Gary, Hammond and East Chicago must equally contribute another $4.4 million of their casino funds to that tax credit pot.
The state next forces the county to pony up an additional $3.5 million in casino cash to the Northwest Indiana Regional Development Authority, a group of appointed officials who apportion money to economic development projects such as the Gary/Chicago International Airport.
Then the county must share another $2.9 million to the 15 cities and towns that lack casinos within their borders on a formula based on their populations.
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See the full article here:
http://www.nwitimes.com/news/local/lake/everybody-wants-a-piece-of-county-government-s-casino-action/article_05c9a503-a598-53ec-8ea0-59954769568c.html
