Lakewood now must wean itself off gambling revenues

The Lakewood City Council must act immediately to protect the city’s budget and grow the city’s economy for everyone’s benefit.

Lakewood’s first initiative campaign is over, and 60 percent of the participating voters agreed to let cardrooms stay. It’s tempting to think that ends the matter. I was among the first public critics of the initiative. I felt and still feel strongly that a city should not entirely ban a legally operating industry. Government has better things to do.

You might think I’d be thrilled to forget the subject ever came up. Not so. What the vote did was give the Lakewood City Council a welcome opportunity to think ahead and budget responsibly for our citizens. At the same time, we could actively work to diversify the city’s economy.

We need to wean Lakewood’s budget from gambling tax revenues. Period. And that’s a good idea even the minicasinos continue to operate for many years to come, simply because of the political uncertainty that cannot be ignored.

The question of gambling has been around as long as people have been around. The issue is not going away now that it has come up.

And all the feelings of pure personal passion we heard again and again in speeches are not going anywhere either. It’s very clear that many of the people who want to ban minicasinos are crusading from either a moral or religious perspective.

Obviously, people who work at casinos could argue that they are moral and religious themselves, but that’s not the point. The point is that the critics were operating from a personal well of enormous passion. And, frankly, it’s also quite well known in town that many of the people behind the initiative are part of a political group that have been trying for a decade to reduce city spending on such things as police and social services.

Next year, when four of the seven council seats are up for election, critics of the minicasinos will run candidates for City Council. And they may well bring back another anti-casino initiative. It’s been well demonstrated, most recently by the Sound Transit proposal, that sometimes it takes a couple of attempts before people vote to approve something.

Now it is the Lakewood City Council that is called to gamble. We are called to ante up the future of good public policy in our city. Those stakes are way too high to spin a wheel.

The council can’t gamble. We fail as leaders if we fail to lead. The situation is dire. Lakewood does not have a rich tax base like cities swimming in auto dealers and retailers. Taxes from minicasinos account for about 8 percent of the city budget and pay for a proportionate share of everything from police to parks.

There were two dozen people in City Hall who wondered for months if they would lose their jobs if the casino initiative passed. Their jobs are not much safer today even though the initiative lost. That’s because they have no idea what future councils may do or future elections may decide.

Police and parks – and our hard-working employees – deserve secure funding.

What the Lakewood City Council needs to do now is cut the reliance on funding next year to 6 percent, in 2010 to 4 percent, and in 2011 to 2 percent, and 2012 to nil.

In the meantime, the monies provided by the gambling tax can go to improve the quality of life with one-time expenditures on roads or parks.

The money can best be used to recruit and retain other tax-generating businesses through various forms of economic development. Lakewood has incredible economic potential in the redeveloping areas outside the military bases as we can already sense in huge changes our council is working on for the Tillicum area. The potential to grow revenues and hire more police is enormous.

My fellow Lakewood City Council members must join me now in weaning Lakewood from its reliance on gambling taxes for essential services. This would mean laying off some highly motivated and good city employees this year. Will that be tough and awful? Yes.

Is it the right thing to do? Yes.

Walter Neary is a Lakewood City Council member. He blogs at www.walterneary.net/blogger.html.