The Las Vegas Sands is getting another roll of the dice on Long Island.
The Nassau County legislature, for the second time, approved a Las Vegas’ Sands Casino lease proposal for the Nassau Veterans Coliseum property, the Long Island Press reported.
It passed by 18-1 again, with the one dissenting vote coming from Minority Leader Delia DeRiggi-Whitton, a Democrat representing Glen Cove, as it did last year.
Sands’ 99-year lease approved in 2023 was nixed when Hofstra University won its suit alleging that the Nassau County Planning Commission failed to properly notify the public of a meeting.
The county appealed but couldn’t do anything with the property in the interim and had to start the lease approval process all over again.
The developer wants to build a $4 billion casino and resort on the property, which is largely supported by the Nassau political establishment. But it still has a ways to go.
The current lease proposal only grants Sands the rights to the land. With a 27-year site-control lease plus three terms of five-year renewals, Sands could have rights to the property for 42 years.
The next hurdle, and the biggest one, will be getting a license to operate a casino on the property. But Sands has said if it doesn’t get one of the three downstate licenses the state plans to hand out next year, it will still open a resort there.
Some Nassau residents have criticized the project, claiming the casino activities will increase drug and alcohol use, DWI fatalities, traffic, prostitution and gambling addiction.
Local labor leaders support the project for the “high-class jobs with high-class wages” it brings, according to Matthew Aracich, president of the Building and Construction Trades Council of Nassau and Suffolk Counties.
— Christina Previte
Correction: An earlier version of this story misstated details about the appeal of the lawsuit challenging the initial lease approval.
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