Bad Casino news again for Blakeman

                                                                            



 

In a blow to Republican County Executive Bruce Blakeman, a Supreme Court judge today ruled that Las Vegas Sands has no lease interest in the Nassau Coliseum.

Today's decision by Nassau Supreme Court Justice Sarika Kapoor is her second punch against Blakeman's plan for Las Vegas Sands to develop a $4 billion casino/entertainment project on the 72-acre Coliseum site in Uniondale.

In November, Kapoor ruled that the Sand's 99-year lease approved by the county legislature in May was void because the county did not follow the state's open meetings law.

Hofstra University, which strongly opposed the proposed Casino development, had sued to overturn the lease.

Despite Kapoor's ruling, the county argued the Sands still had an interest in the Coliseum because the current lease held by Nassau Live Center had been assigned to the Sands. 

But Kapoor's decision today again agreed with Hofstra that Sands did not legally take over the existing lease.

Nassau has been trying unsuccessfully for more than 30 years to develop the Coliseum site but every plan has fallen apart. Meanwhile, the number of events and amount of revenues generated by the outdated Coliseum continues to decrease.

The next big question following Kapoor's decision is what happens to the $54 million that the Sands paid to Nassau last year in return for control of the Coliseum site?



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