The Mass. Gaming Commission will meet Thursday morning to debate and vote on whether the development that Wynn Resorts has proposed across the street from its resort casino in Everett would fall under commission jurisdiction, but gaming regulators are also poised to address concerns that mid-sized theater operators have raised about current practices at Encore Boston Harbor.
In addition to the vote on whether to include the entertainment, retail and restaurant development eyed for parcels along Broadway in Everett in the casino’s official “gaming establishment” footprint, commissioners are also expected Thursday to consider “the permissible use of certain areas of the gaming establishment, such as the ballrooms, for the conduct of live entertainment,” the meeting agenda says.
Wynn’s plan has already been scaled back in part to accommodate a restriction on entertainment venue sizes baked into the state’s 2011 expanded gaming law. Under the law, casinos may not build or operate entertainment venues with seating for between 1,000 and 3,500 guests, so Wynn adjusted its proposed entertainment venue from about 1,800 seats to 999 seats to be in compliance.
But when the Gaming Commission held a public hearing last week to accept input on the proposed development that would eventually include the entertainment venue, retail outlets, a brewery or brewpub, hotels, restaurants and a parking garage, representatives from Medford and the Chevalier Theatre there accused the Everett casino of already violating the law by holding and planning events in its ballroom with seating for between 1,000 and 3,500 patrons.
“The Encore has continually had concerts where seats have been sold and seats have been put in their ballroom that they built that are between 1,000 and 3,500 seats,” Dan Rabinovitz, an attorney for the city of Medford, said. “That’s a straight violation of the law. That’s not a violation of the spirit of the law, that’s a violation of the law.”
In an Encore Boston Harbor sales kit, Wynn Resorts lists the square footage of its Picasso Ballroom as 36,642 square feet and a chart appears to show that the ballroom can accommodate 3,408 people when set up as a theater, 2,688 people when set up as a classroom and 2,819 people for a reception. The entertainment venue restrictions would not come into play for non-entertainment events like business conferences or a large wedding reception.
Included in the packet of materials that commissioners received ahead of their March 3 meeting was the Ticketmaster seating chart for a Dec. 20, 2019 concert in Encore’s ballroom that showed more than 2,300 seats either sold or available. The packet also included a Ticketmaster seating chart that appears to offer more than 1,500 seats and general admission for a fight night that Encore plans to host on March 17.
Rabinovitz said the Gaming Commission ought to either fine Encore for having violated the restrictions on the number of seats allowed at casino entertainment venues or “at least issue a very stern warning that they’re not to have events anymore in the ballroom between 1,000 and 3,500 seats.”
“I will tell you — I don’t say this to be over aggressive or to be a jerk or anything else — but I will tell you if we find out that they are going to have those kinds of events again, one of the things that my clients are going to consider is to have me file something in Superior Court for injunctive relief on that,” he told the Gaming Commission. “I really don’t want to have to do that. But, if necessary, you know, that may happen.”
The issue of the March 17 fight night — officially Combat Zone 75 — came up briefly at the commission’s March 3 meeting. The agenda for the meeting called for a discussion and vote on “Encore Boston Harbor Scheduled Events” but Executive Director Karen Wells steered the issue onto the commission’s back burner for the time being.
“Certainly the MGC has been monitoring that issue. I believe the commission has been aware of that issue for an ongoing period of time. Nothing’s ever been presented before the commission and no determination has been made that an event between 1,000 and 1,500 is necessarily a violation of the law, so I think that needs to be clear,” Wells said.
Wells said she did not “want to put the commission in a position of having to opine on something that is not even ripe, necessarily, for any discussion” and said she was talking to Encore officials to find out “if that event on the 17th is even going to have patrons and or seats within that range that will even trigger that discussion.”
As of Wednesday afternoon, the Ticketmaster listing for Combat Zone 75 showed roughly 1,522 ticketed seats on the seating chart with about 60 of the seats still available to be purchased at either $149.50 or $199.50 per ticket.
The Everett development discussion is the only business item on the Gaming Commission’s agenda for Thursday’s 10 a.m. meeting.
The agenda shows that the discussion is likely to include Joe Delaney, the commission’s chief of community affairs; the commission’s top lawyer Todd Grossman; Encore’s senior vice president and general counsel Jacqui Krum; and Tony Starr, an attorney from Mintz Levin who represents the casino company and has argued that the proposed development should not be considered part of the gaming establishment.
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