Landing a casino in Slidell is just about a done deal. All legislative hurdles seem to have been past, now it’s down to a vote of the people for approval.
The resort will bring millions into the local economy, with 5% going to local governments. But how will that government money be split?
Now an agreement has been drawn up by the St. Tammany Parish Development District on how the distribution will go.
According to the Times-Picayune/New Orleans Advocate Pacific Peninsula Entertainment will shell out between $7.5-to-$9-million dollars a year to the Parish.
The parish government will get the lion’s share of the money: 37.5%. Of that percentage, the parish says 12.5% of that total will designated to be spent in the Parish entertainment zone, which the paper says is the unincorporated areas around the city of Slidell.
The next largest portion is 16% going to the Community Enhancement Grant Fund.
The City of Slidell then gets 15% of that take.
After that the percentages drop drastically into single digits with the smallest slice of 1% going to the Northshore Harbor Center.
With the parish getting the largest piece of the pie, that could potentially be $2.8-to-$3.4-million dollars a year.
The City of Slidell is also happy with the arrangement since the parish is required to spend 12.5% of their take around unincorporated areas surrounding Slidell.
In all Pacific Peninsula Entertainment is budgeting $35-million dollars for a sports and recreation complex in Eastern St. Tammany Parish.
