The Village of Garden City has filed a lawsuit against Las Vegas Sands Corporation and Nassau County. It seeks to derail the company’s plans for a resort casino on the site of the Nassau Coliseum. The suit objects to the handling of environmental studies leading up to the county leasing 72 acres to the casino developer.
The complaint alleges that Sands and Nassau County failed to properly research the impact on traffic. Garden City officials claim the project will result in increased traffic accidents and additional infrastructure obligations.
The county has agreed to lease the land to Sands for 42 years, paving the way for its casino application.
Sands is one of several developers that have submitted plans to build a casino in downstate New York. Gov. Kathy Hochul’s 2022 budget allowed for three downstate licenses.
Opposition to casino dates back to 2023
Despite approval of three downstate casinos two years ago, none have been approved or built. The deadline to submit bids to the New York State Gaming Commision has been extended to the end of June 2025. New York online casinos remain off-limits.
The Village of Garden City’s distaste for the proposed Sands casino goes back to 2023 when the gaming company proposed building on what is now the grounds of the Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum, a multipurpose venue that hosts concerts and sporting events.
At the time, the neighboring town of Hempstead was reviewing a Sands petition to rezone the coliseum’s 70-acre site for casino and hotel use. Village of Garden City officials urged Hempstead to reject the petition.
In July 2023, Garden City posted a bulletin outlining its reasons for not wanting the casino project in its backyard.
“The presence of a casino and proposed ancillary uses at the Nassau Hub would result in a negative impact on our quality of life that would be dramatic, and the placing of a 24-hour casino and proposed ancillary uses in the heart of Nassau County would permanently impact the character of the surrounding communities.”
The statement went on to say that building a casino in Nassau County would bring “serious security issues,” including “illegal activity, crime, human sex trafficking, DWIs, prostitution, drugs and problem gambling.”
The village has some standing for its complaints. A 2021 study published by the University of Illinois found that crime increases in an area with a casino. Additionally, it claimed that problem gamblers commit crimes at a rate that’s around two to three times higher than non-problem gamblers.
The Village of Garden City’s lawsuit focuses mainly on traffic concerns. The next court date at Nassau County State Supreme Court is set for Feb. 6 in front of Judge Lisa Cairo.
Village has come under fire in the past
This isn’t the first time that The Village of Garden City’s officials have pushed back on development in the area.
In 2016, the US Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit upheld a ruling that the village discriminated against an affordable housing project slated for the area. The court noted that the village’s efforts to block the development violated protections under the Fair Housing Act.
“The tenor of the discussion at public hearings and in the flyer circulated throughout the community shows that citizen opposition, though not overtly race-based, was directed at a potential influx of poor, minority residents.”
