Developer trying to buy property near Suffolk Downs for slots parlor

http://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2015/09/30/thailand-based-developer-trying-buy-property-near-suffolk-downs-for-slots-parlor/3EvPgnNLtIGM8RKoXPiGGK/story.html



Developer trying to buy property near Suffolk Downs for slots parlor
By Andrea Estes and Stephanie Ebbert Globe Staff
October 01, 2015

Eugene McCain, the secretive figure behind the ballot campaign for a second slots parlor in Massachusetts, has been quietly trying to assemble a broad swath of property near Suffolk Downs, where he hopes to build a luxury hotel and gambling facility if his campaign succeeds.

McCain has been offering big money — $5.5 million for a rundown trailer park and more than $1 million for a defunct bar — for several houses and other properties behind the track, according to their owners and a lawyer who represents some of them.

“I am making offers on many properties,” McCain, a developer who lives in Thailand and has local ties, acknowledged in an e-mail, “but this is not something I can presently address as these are private discussions and contingent transactions.”

The Massachusetts political world was surprised last month when the attorney general gave preliminary approval to McCain’s ballot question, which could add a second slots casino license to the mix of three casinos and one slots parlor allowed by the 2011 casino law. It could offer a second chance at big time gambling in Revere, where Suffolk Downs was shot down by the Massachusetts Gaming Commission.