Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, October 19, 1995 TAG: 9510190014
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 5 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: MATT CHITTUM
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
In 1990, the county had the fourth-highest poverty rate in the country. Its citizens had the sixth-lowest per capita income ($4,625). Unemployment was at 23 percent.
Casino gambling was legalized in Mississippi in 1992. The first casino opened in Tunica in October of that year. Now there are about a dozen in the county.
Unemployment was down to less than 9 percent after two years of legalized casinos. The number of residents on food stamps was cut in half.
By this year, the infant mortality rate was down by more than 10 percent, and over 80 percent of the county's court-ordered child support was being paid.
The state's gaming commission estimates that nearly 30,000 jobs have been created by the casinos statewide.
Newspaper accounts tell of people living in tarpaper shacks with no electricity or running water, though none of this is visible on the bus ride from Memphis.
According to one newspaper report, some Tunica residents say the casinos have not done much to improve their lives. All the new jobs are low paying, and all the affordable housing has disappeared.
The county's annual budget has grown from $3 million to $28 million since 1992. But over 70 percent of the budget is set aside for improving roads - like U.S. 61 from Memphis - the county's comptroller has said. Only 20 percent goes into the county's general operating fund, and less than 10 percent goes to education.
"These casinos aren't helping these people," says one security guard standing at the polished brass doors of the Sheraton. She drives in from Memphis to work here.
by CNB