Miffed Ontario finance minister tells Toronto plenty of cities would love a casino

Sounding like a spurned suitor, Ontario finance minister Dwight Duncan says if downtown councillors like Adam Vaughan and Mike Layton don’t want his fancy gambling complex, he’ll find someone who will. Having found Toronto somewhat unreceptive to the prospect of to a casino on its waterfront, Duncan warned the city that other jurisdictions have “quite aggressively” lobbied the province for the project—including Hamilton, whose mayor, Bob Bratina, has already “put feelers out” and has a meeting scheduled with the Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corporation later this month. Duncan says Toronto stands to miss out on the casino revenue and a “golden mile” of spinoffs that could spur between $3 and $4 billion in investment and create thousands of jobs. Still, many—including Richard Florida—think the casino wouldn’t be the economic boon that Duncan is hyping it to be. (To be precise, Florida’s words were “unmitigated disaster.”) Read the entire story [Globe and Mail] »