By: Diana Johnsen
djohnsen@kcautv.com
Forget the presentations.
It's much more than just slides and bullet points now.
On Saturday, about forty local leaders traveled to Kansas City to get a taste of what a "Hollywood Casino" might look like in Woodbury County.
"The creativity of the machines and the layout was what got me. It was not extremely opulent, but entirely new from what we have in our community," said Dick Pruehs of Sioux City.
Penn National Gaming Inc. and the Greater Siouxland Improvement Association have submitted two proposals for a land based, "Hollywood theme" casino in Woodbury County.
One off of Gordon Drive in downtown Sioux City, the other near Salix.
Penn National has already presented to the public the proposals along with the adjoining hotel possibilities.
"The county location is going to have a 150 room hotel in the first phase where that's a second phase project for the downtown location. The reason being is that there's already hotel product downtown," said Karen Bailey, Penn National's Director of Public Affairs.
On Saturday, the group was able to tour the casino's main gambling floor that's filled with over 2,000 slot and table games.
The group got a behind the scenes look at what it's like for employees at the casino.
Folks got to see where employees wine and dine in the casino and where they work out in their own private fitness center.
They also had lunch in the casino's sports bar, one of the seven restaurants and lounges in the casino.
It was the number of restaurants and lounges though that some might want to see less of in the Woodbury County version.
"I would not want our new casino to take away any business from our already successful restaurants we have in town," said Cathleen Bonstead of the Greater Siouxland Improvement Association. "On the other hand, I know that we can successfully support some new restaurants that come along with a new casino."
While this may have sealed the deal for some Siouxlanders in forming an opinion on which casino they would like to see in Siouxland, it is the Iowa Racing and Gaming Commission that will have the final say.
