Mohegan Sun improves bid for Catskills casino

“We will certainly want to welcome back to the Catskills those who themselves, or through their parents and grandparents, have such fond associations with the Catskills in its heyday, but more critical will be ensuring generations of new visitors,” Mohegan Sun C.E.O. Mitchell Etess said in an update to the company’s casino license application sent to the state’s Gaming Commission on Monday.

“To that end, and to promote the new concentration of gaming and entertainment amenities at the Concord, we are pledging to dedicate a portion of our gross gaming revenue annually—0.5%—to a new marketing and tourism fund to focus on the Catskills and Hudson Valley region as a gaming and entertainment region, and we will encourage others to participate to maximize the program and its impact,” Etess said.

Mohegan Sun, the Connecticut-based Native American owned casino company, is also trying to win the right to build a casino in the lower Hudson Valley, where the competition among potential licensees is fierce, and there have so far been nine different bids for just two available spots.

Mohegan Sun’s proposed casino would be developed on the site of the former Concord Resort in the Catskills.