BY SCOT ANDREW PITZER
Times Staff Writer
Pro Casino Adams County spokesmen Jeff Klein and Tommy Gilbert believe that the preservation groups should have remained neutral on plans that would convert the Cumberland Township-based Eisenhower Inn into an exclusive slots resort.
“These Washington, D.C. and Harrisburg, Pennsylvania-based lobbyist groups are only interested in one thing and that is to use this casino debate to raise money for their own greed,” Klein and Gilbert wrote in a statement.�
The coalition against LeVan’s “Mason Dixon Resort & Casino” project includes the Civil War Preservation Trust, the National Parks Conservation Association, the National Trust for Historic Preservation, and Preservation Pennsylvania.
“Not one of these groups has helped to create or save one job since 2006 in this county,” wrote Klein and Gilbert.
Pro Casino Adams County has touted jobs, new tax revenues and economic development as reasons for supporting LeVan and state lawmaker Joseph Lashinger’s effort in seeking a Category Three slots license from the state’s Gaming Control Board. LeVan has promised up to 200 new jobs — and has guaranteed Adams County residents the first crack at obtaining those positions — at a time when the county’s unemployment rate has topped eight percent.
“The county has experienced a 35 percent decrease in visitation since 2002 and we are now at nearly nine percent in unemployment which equates to nearly 10,000 residents,” said Klein and Gilbert.
“Not one of these groups bothered to contact our organization to request information or obtain the local pulse of area residents,” said Pro Casino Adams County. “Had they done so or even bothered to interview those unemployed residents, maybe they could have a clearer picture of what we — the residents — think and desire.”
The preservation coalition opposes LeVan’s plan because of its “proximity” to a portion of the 6,000-acre Gettysburg National Military Park. Civil War Preservation Trust spokesman Jim Campi argued that the battlefield is located “only a half-mile away” from the Eisenhower Inn.
But the 300-room hotel and adjoining recreational complex are situated atop land that is already zoned for mixed-use commercial development, along Business 15 in southern Adams County. The property is located closer to the Maryland border (two miles) than it is from downtown Gettysburg (five miles).
The Battlefield Harley Davidson owner and Gettysburg area philanthropist intends to file a gaming application by the April 7 deadline, and he is expected to face intense competition from as many as five other groups.
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