Seneca's Success With Slots Facility Pushes for Gaming Expansion

On January 1st, 2008, the Seneca Gaming Corporation was about to open the door on its lone slots only gaming facility in Buffalo. The gaming corporation confirmed that they will begin the enlargement of their temporary casino facility, the Seneca Buffalo Creek Casino located on Michigan Avenue to a facility that features 244 slot machines from a facility that features 135 slot machines. The gaming expansion, which will cost $3.2 million, will feature an addition building perpendicular to their present 6,000 square foot facility.

The spokesperson for the Seneca Gaming organization Philip J. Pantano commented that the immense success of the temporary facility is fueling the facility expansion. The temporary slots casino facility will be enlarged and is expected to open in 2010. But the report filed by the tribe also said that if the lawsuits filed against them were successful, they will be force to shutdown their temporary slots casino facility and to forget their expansion plans.

Seneca gaming corporation, which plans to open their $333 million casino/hotel facility at Cobblestone by 2010, opened their present facility on July 3rd, posting a record setting 50,000 customers on its initial month of operation. While player attendance at the Seneca Buffalo Creek Casino has normalized to a monthly average of 36,000 players, it is not uncommon for players to wait in the queue during gaming hours.

In their yearly report before the federal Securities and Exchange Commission, the Seneca Gaming Corporation stated that they have earned $6.2 million from their temporary casino facility from July up to September 30th, 2007. Under the casino profit sharing formula of New York, the local part of those profits will be $350,000 for the 1st quarter of the casino's operation.

Based on those profits, for one year, when all of the 244 slot machines are functioning, the city will earn $2.5 million. The Seneca Gaming Corporation achieved a good performance for 2007 with good revenues coming from gaming, food and lodging interests. Gross profits reached to $696.9 million from $600 million in an annual comparison.

But increased operational expenses that are together with the plan expansion also affected key costs resulting in a $4.2 million dropped in net income, from $123.4 million in 2006, up to $119.2 million in the year ended. But the improvement of Seneca Gaming in Niagara Falls, Salamanca and Buffalo had a good effect on the profit side.

Gaming profits are at $595.8 million for the period ended September 30th, which is up from $519.6 million in the past twelve months. As of September 30th, 2007, Seneca Gaming managed more than 147,000 feet of gaming space at its three casino facilities with a total of 4,199 slot machines and 102 gambling tables. It has a total of 840 hotel rooms. The organization has 4,737 employees, including 41 staff at its Buffalo establishment.

Sunday, 20 January 2008
Darren G. Strachan