(Danville) — Officials at Caesars are hinting at a mid-December opening date for their permanent casino and resort in Danville.
In a conference call with investors this week, Caesars Vice-President Tom Reeg said the transition from the big tent on West Main to the full 650 million dollar Caesars Virginia Casino and Resort should be quick and seamless. “We have a tent that right now sits in a parking lot of the permanent. That tent will operate until the moment that we open the permanent,” Reeg said. “There isn’t a — you shut it down and you go through testing, that sort of thing, you do all that while the temporary is still open.”
Reeg adds that revenues will see little fluctuation with the anticipated speed of the transition. “So it should just be as if the temporary just became dramatically larger from one day to the next,” Reeg said. “I would say you probably consider the — view it as if the temporary is opening or is operating until the middle of December and you get a couple of weeks this year from the permanent. That probably shifts a few days in either direction, but that’s a good thing.”
Vice-President Anthony Carano says once the permanent facility is open, the sky’s the limit. “We’re really excited because it opens up a whole another segment of our database on that Eastern Seaboard, someone that may not come and just travel for the day, but we’re going to have a beautiful new 340-room hotel, great restaurants with some celebrity chefs,” Carano said. “And so it attracts a whole new clientele that may not be coming to the temporary facility today as well.
As of the end of September, Caesars had taken in over 300 million dollars since they opened the temporary casino last year. The city of Danville has collected over 17 million dollars in gaming-tax revenue from the casino. The city also gets reimbursement as part of a citing agreement with Caesars.
Image courtesy Caesars Entertainment