Dallas Mayor Eric Johnson has heard discussions about bringing a Las Vegas-style casino resort to his city but has stated he, nor the city council, has been approached and their approval is needed before any moves can be made to expand gambling in Texas.
Eye on Dallas
Mavericks’ owner Mark Cuban recently sold the majority of his shares to Miriam Adelson, widow of casino maven Sheldon Adelson, and has repeatedly called for a casino resort in Dallas adjacent to a new arena to make the city a world-class travel destination.
Texas has been one of the few holdouts regarding gambling in general as the allure of mobile sports betting has been shunned, with only a few tribal bingo and slot parlors as the only bastion for anyone in Texas who has a gambling itch to scratch.
Cuban’s Plan
But Mark Cuban would like to change all that and would like to do it in concert with Adelson and her son-in-law Patrick Dumont. Adelson’s position as the largest stakeholder in the Las Vegas Sands would have a profound impact on the project and provide the experience required to get it from the drawing board to completion.
Cuban still owns a stake in the Mavericks and his deal with Adelson stipulates he will continue to maintain control of its basketball operations. Therefore, his desire to bring a basketball arena in conjunction with a casino resort to Dallas is understandable.
“My goal, and we’d partner with Sands, is when we build a new arena it’ll be in the middle of a resort and casino. That’s the mission,” Cuban told the Dallas Morning News in December 2022.
Cuban also added: “Texas is such an amazing state that we need to be a destination. And this is the way to do it. And partnering with the Sands Corporation, literally, there’s no reason why we can’t build a huge resort destination in the city proper of Dallas. There’s plenty of places to do it.”
Don’t Forget the Little Guys
Cuban has repeatedly expressed his desire for a world-class gambling destination in Dallas but, apparently he hasn’t bothered to talk directly to the politicians who call Dallas home. Naturally, any possibility of making a project of this magnitude happen would have to get their blessing.
At a Dallas Regional Chamber luncheon earlier this month, Mayor Eric Johnson stated neither Cuban nor anyone else from his team has contacted him. Johnson insisted that state approval is not the only imprimatur required.
“That’s not something that just because the legislature said can happen, just happens,” Johnson said. “I haven’t been a part of those conversations. I don’t feel like they’re really happening. And I think at some point, if he’s serious about really having casino gambling and he’s serious about having it in Dallas, I think that’s a conversation a lot of people are willing to have, but we haven’t had it, just to be honest.”
Mayor Johnson said the city council would need to be consulted, and if there is to be a change in the gambling landscape in Dallas, local approval is absolute.
Speaking to the crowd of local businessmen and women, Mayor Johnson asserted: “The folks I sit around the horseshoe with every day, I can guarantee you are going to have to have a say in where you plop a casino in the City of Dallas. Or whether you get to plop a casino in the City of Dallas.”
Calculators
