Back in 1992, William Weidner, then president of Hollywood Casino of Aurora Inc., set out to Springfield to kill then-Mayor Richard M. Daley’s plans for a $2 billion “mega-casino” in downtown Chicago.
Weidner and other members of what was known as the “riverboat alliance” were worried that any such facility in Chicago would suck away business from their nascent riverboat casinos in Aurora, Joliet, Elgin and other communities downstate. This was an act of self-interest. But that wasn’t the language Weidner used.
Instead, he argued that any such casino would run contrary to the intent of the Illinois legislature, which had justified its approval of gambling in Illinois by arguing that these new riverboats would revive the downtowns of communities that were demonstrably struggling with deindustrialization and other economic shifts.
