MADISON — Two candidates for the state’s highest elected offices turned out Tuesday night to help lead a meeting of about 500 residents against a proposed casino development.
Gubernatorial candidate Mark Walker, a Republican, who for six years represented Rockingham County in the U.S. House of Representatives, opened the packed and emotional meeting at Ellisboro Baptist Church.
Rockingham County Sheriff Sam Page, who is running for lieutenant governor as a Republican, sat with Walker and urged casino opponents to ask their county commissioners to call for a referendum on the issue.
In Nash County, where casino development is also being proposed, county commissioners last week voted 5-1 in favor of a referendum — something Walker reminded the crowd.
Page reminded them of something else: “I’ve seen the destruction, and I oppose casinos in this county and anywhere in the state. Let the people make the decision. Let the people vote,’’ said Page, as the audience clapped and yelled in support.
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In speaking out against casino development, Walker and Page have pitted themselves against the most powerful Republican in the General Assembly — Senate leader Phil Berger of Eden, who also represents Rockingham County in Raleigh.
Berger is one of the architects of a draft bill being considered by state legislators that would allow Rockingham, Nash and Anson counties to operate casinos. He says it will be a major boon to the county’s economy by creating $6 million in annual tax revenue.
The bill calls for massive development by one casino developer with a minimum investment of $500 million in each county, as well as about 1,700 jobs per location.
The projects are touted as “entertainment districts’’ — a specialty of The Cordish Companies, a Baltimore-based gaming group seeking to rezone 192 acres of farmland along U.S. 220 and just 60 yards from a summer retreat for children with chronic and life-threatening illnesses.
The land is currently zoned “residential/agricultural” and the county planning board voted 5-2 against the casino developer’s request to rezone it “commercial” in June.
But county commissioners still have the power to approve commercial zoning when they meet on Aug. 21.
On Wednesday, nearly 3,000 residents of the rural county of 91,000, considered one of the poorest 40 counties among the state’s 100, had signed an online petition to block casino development at change.org.
Organizers at the meeting Tuesday distributed a truck-bed-full of “Casino No” lawn signs and lapel buttons. By Wednesday morning, they studded roadsides all over the county.
“They’re coming here because we are only 15 miles from the airport,’’ said Chis Rodenbough, manager of Camp Carefree, the summer retreat for children with illnesses. “We’re not Las Vegas, and we don’t wanna be.”
Whitney Shelton, who lives close to the U.S. 220 parcel, said she worries about highway safety and the region’s health care system if a casino is built. A nurse for the past 14 years, she dreads navigating through what she thinks could potentially be heavy casino traffic to make her way to late-night hospital shifts and emergency calls.
Doctors, nurses, first responders and police in western Rockingham County, already facing burnout because of short-staffing, would be overwhelmed by the thousands of patrons traveling to a casino here, Shelton said.
“Friends, neighbors, we do not want to gamble with our side of the county,’’ she said.
Clark Erskine, a coach at McMichael High School in Mayodan and a father of two, said a casino will sully the culture of the area for a generation of children. Erskine, who lives across the highway from the proposed casino location, reminded residents that Huntsville Elementary School is only two miles from the parcel.
“This is not the right growth, not the right time and not the right location.’’