The odds against slot machines being installed in pari-mutuel facilities in Bridgeport, New Haven and Windsor Locks just became higher, now that Senate Majority Leader Bob Duff, D-Norwalk, (left) says they won’t be debated in his chamber. “While this will be a difficult budget season, Connecticut’s economy continues to recover,” Duff said this morning in reaction to Jim Amann, the former speaker of the House, who is the lobbyist for the Shoreline Star pari-mutuel facility in Bridgeport. Amann last week asked the Public Safety Committee to approve the concept of installing slot machines in the three pari-mutuels, if the Native Americans at the Mohegan Sun and Foxwoods agree. “The unemployment rate is down and we continue to grow jobs,” Duff said. “Former Speaker Amann’s idea of putting slot machines at off-track-betting sites near the Massachusetts border is not the answer and any expansion of gaming needs to be done in consultation with the tribes. With that said, this proposal will not be raised in the Senate.”
Any such expansion without the permission of the two tribes would violate the contract with the tribes that gives the state 25 percent of the betting “handle” from their slot machines. That’s a relatively meager $290 million this year, compared to the fat cat year of 2007, when $430 million was transferred to the state. But that’s still enough money for Gov. Dannel P. Malloy. Malloy, left, 
speaking at an unrelated event in Branford’s historic Owenego Inn this morning, said that off-the-reservation slots will not be part of his budget plans when he presents his two-year spending package next week to the General Assembly.
“There is an agreement in place, which I have said for years is binding on the state and I don’t disagree with the spokesman for the tribal nations that it’s a binding agreement and if we violate, it we violate it. And if we violate it, we violate it at our own peril and it puts what has been a largely shrinking amount of money….it puts it into even greater peril. I’ve had to manage a bunch of natural disasters while I’ve been governor. I’ve also had to manage the declining revenue from the casions, which people tend to forget about. And I think we’ve done that well but I’m not looking to expedite that in any way. So I think anything we do with respect to that form or any type of gaming, along those lines, has to be done as a cooperative or an agreed-upon basis with the tribal nations.”
Blogster: “So does you budget include possibly opening talks with the Indians tribes?”
Malloy: “It’s not something I’m raising.”