Empire Resorts joint venture in gambling development gets USD 250 mln financing

Philadelphia (AP) — Empire Resorts Inc. said Tuesday that a joint-venture partner in an upstate New York hotel and casino project has received USD 250 million in financing from an insurer with close ties to labor unions.

The casino developer said Concord Associates LP has received financing from Union Labor Life Insurance Co. to build the USD 1 billion Concord-Empire Resorts Hotel and Casino in the Catskills. The project is expected to generate union construction and local jobs.

„This project is an historic one due to its size, the timing in the economic cycle, and its job creation potential,“ said Louis Cappelli, president of Cappelli Enterprises Inc. and managing member of Concord Associates, in a statement.

The hotel-casino complex includes a 750-room hotel and 300,000 square feet of space for a casino, ballrooms, meeting rooms, retail stores, and other uses.

The joint venture project will also include a 7,500-seat event center as well as a harness racetrack. They will be built on on the site of the former historic Concord Hotel in the Catskills, about 100 miles northwest of New York City.

The Concord was once one of the largest of the Catskills resorts, but it fell into bankruptcy in the 1990s and was sold to developers.

Shares of Monticello, N.Y.-based Empire Resorts rose 15 cents, or 6.8 percent, to USD 2.38 in afternoon trading.