SCHOOL FUNDING ONE OF GAMBLING QUESTIONS

If Cape Girardeau voters do approve riverboat gambling Tuesday, the schools won't get the $360,000 windfall promised by gaming proponents, education officials say.

That is one of a number of disputes still percolating as the riverboat gambling campaigns head toward Tuesday's election.

The benefit to the schools has been a familiar part of the Boyd Gaming Corp.'s pitch beginning with the first election in June. The $360,000 figure is the annual estimated property taxes from the gambling operation.

That pitch has been continued into the current election. But Missouri now has a new school foundation funding formula that appears to change the extent to which the city schools can benefit from new property taxes.

School officials say any increase in local tax revenues now will be offset by an equal decrease in state funding.

"Under Senate Bill 380, as we know it today, there are only two ways for local schools to get substantially more new money -- have more kids or raise local taxes," Superintendent Neyland Clark said.

"Technically, we would get the new tax money but also we have to deduct that amount under the formula.

"It really does not help us," he said.

Both Boyd President William Boyd and David Knight, a spokesman for the pro-gambling Yes Group, agree that is one interpretation of the new law.

"If their interpretation is anywhere close to correct, we anticipate a legal challenge to the law," Knight said.

"It will result in the biggest robbery in the state of Missouri since Jesse James."

Such an interpretation would affect every development in the city, in Knight's view. "What it would do is set a ceiling on the amount of money a municipality could generate within its own district."

But he questions whether the schools' view of the law will stand up. "There are provisions within the law that will certainly offset the negative impact of the funds that theoretically would go back to Jefferson City," he said.

He referred to a revolving fund which allows municipalities to borrow money generated from gaming for the purpose of school construction.

The Rev. Charles Grant, a spokesman for Citizens Against Riverboat Gambling, wonders why the Yes Group continues to distribute leaflets containing the $360,000 figure.

One appeared as an insert in the most recent issue of the Capaha Arrow, the student newspaper at Southeast Missouri State University.

Knight said that advertising was scheduled too far in advance to cancel. "We have made an honest attempt at correcting or at least withholding any specific reference (to the figure) pending further clarification of the law," he said.

Knight, meanwhile, charges that the Citizens Against Riverboat Gambling committee continues erroneously repeating that $45 million in gambling revenues will leave the Cape Girardeau economy annually if a riverboat comes.

The amount is the estimated annual gross receipts for the riverboat, Knight points out. From that, the company would have to cover a $22 million payroll, and approximately $1.9 million that would go the city of Cape Girardeau.

The company expects to spend another $1.5 million on supplies and fuel, Knight said.

"These may or may not have been intentional (misrepresentations)," he said. "They may very well be due to a lack of understanding of Missouri law."

Grant says other information distributed by the Boyd Gaming Corporation has been misleading.

Grant says the company's contention that the average salary of riverboat employees will be $27,000 recently was contradicted by a spokesman who said the proposed Cape Girardeau casino's wage scale has not yet been set.

Knight says the average is an estimate made by the company "based on Missouri law, which establishes the minimum amount and therefore would give a general benchmark for estimating the average."

Questions also have arisen about whether siting of the riverboat development just north of the foot of Broadway is feasible. Boyd said engineering studies show the area to be "a viable site. Nothing has been indicated to us otherwise."

One who disagrees is 80-year-old Woody Rushing, who recently had his towboat pilot's license renewed for another five years. The former president of Missouri Dry Dock in Cape Girardeau doesn't think a boat will be allowed to dock anywhere between Broadway and Cape Rock.

Rushing, who opposes riverboat gambling, says putting a boat there would endanger both river traffic and riverboat passengers.

Operators of heavy tows, which push 25 barges or more, must line up close to the Missouri side of the river when heading south, Rushing says. Lights from a riverboat would make this passage doubly difficult, he added.

"If there's anything you don't want it's to be faced by lights."

Thursday in Memphis, Rushing attended a marine industry meeting with included the U.S. Coast Guard and the Army Corps of Engineers.

Riverboat gambling was one topic of discussion. "Riverboats are causing real problems on the lower Mississippi with their locations," he said.

A shipping company, an oil company and environmentalists have filed suit against the corps and a gambling company to prevent an approved riverboat from docking in Vicksburg, Miss., Rushing said.

Earlis Glodo, who pilots lighter tows for Missouri Barge Lines north of St. Louis, said he wouldn't anticipate a problem navigating past a riverboat here.

"I don't see where that would be in the way of anything," he said.

His tug already chugs past gambling boats in East Alton, Ill., East St. Louis and Bettendorf, Iowa.

But he says pilots of heavy tows might feel differently. "What looks like plenty of room to me might not be to them. They do slide a lot."

Knight says the answers to most of the questions that haven't been answered about riverboat gambling can be found in the state law that made it legal. He said most people aren't aware of its provisions for affirmative action, public safety, regulation and promotion of Missouri and tourism.

While the leaders of Citizens Against Riverboat Gambling have been accused of trying to enforce their morals on everyone, leaders of the Yes Group have faced criticism that they have a vested interest in the issue.

Mostly downtown business people, some could benefit directly -- either through increased sales or the sale of land holdings.

"The leaders would be among 35,000 other people that will benefit from this development," Knight responded. "It will create jobs, provide investment and also aid in the redevelopment and restoration of our riverfront area."