Gaming Commission Award
The Massachusetts Gaming Commission meeting on September 17, 2014 for the formal awarding of the eastern Massachusetts casino license to Wynn Resorts.
(Garrett Quinn, MassLive.com)
BOSTON -- A commissioner and the executive director of the Massachusetts Gaming Commission are stepping down.
Commissioner Jim McHugh and Executive Director Rick Day announced Monday that they are leaving the commission.
Both officials, in public statements, stressed personal reasons for leaving. McHugh, who leaves Sept. 30, said he had delayed his retirement to serve on the commission for the last three years. Day, who will leave on a vacation next week and will then remain on board for some time as a consultant, said he plans to return to his home state of Montana.
In some ways, the commission is at a turning point.
The Penn National Gaming-owned Plainridge Park Casino recently opened and is operating as the first slots parlor in the state, marking the conclusion of a long selection and licensing process. The commission is at the beginning of the selection process for a potential casino in southeastern Massachusetts.
MGM Springfield has cleared most of the regulatory hurdles that it needs to go forward with construction - although the commission is currently considering MGM's request to delay its opening by a year due to nearby highway construction.
But there are also loose ends. Most significantly, numerous lawsuits are threatening to upend the licensing of Wynn Resorts, which plans to build a casino in Everett.
Day said in a statement that his top priority as executive director has been to get in place the best regulatory structure possible before the opening of the Plainridge Park Casino. "I am proud of the work accomplished over the last 2.5 years and pleased that the state is now experiencing the benefits of jobs and revenue currently being derived from the new gaming industry," Day said.
McHugh also stressed the work that went into the Plainridge opening, which involved everything from conducting background checks to writing regulations to training police officers.
"My objective was to participate in creating a first rate public agency to oversee this new and, in view of many, highly controversial Massachusetts industry," McHugh said. "Together, we all have created that agency. It is now pressure tested and well positioned to take on the many tasks that remain."
Attorney General Maura Healey's office will develop a process to select a new gaming commissioner.
There are five members of the Gaming Commission, an independent commission that oversees all aspects of the state's new gaming industry.
McHugh earned $64,500 from his work for the Gaming Commission in 2014. Day earned $185,000.
Father Richard McGowan, an adjunct associate professor of economics at Boston College who studies gambling, said the resignations by the two staffers are a "real loss" to the commission. He called McHugh "the most competent commissioner we had."
McGowan said it will be a challenge for two new people to get up to speed, with the controversy pending over the Wynn license and the licensing process in the early stages in southeastern Massachusetts.
"I certainly understand why Commissioner McHugh wants to retire...but it's certainly not going to help anything out with the commission getting the work done quickly," McGowan said.
This story has been updated with comments from McGowan.