Megaresort on My Doorstep: Local Resident Attitudes toward Foxwoods Casino and Casino Gambling on Nearby Indian Reservation Land

Abstract

Residents of three rural communities in southeastern Connecticut, adjacent to the Native American-owned Foxwoods Resort and Casino, have mixed reactions to the casino and their Native American neighbors. Three years of surveys are used to monitor changing attitudes, analyze and model current attitudes, and predict acceptance offuture development.

The social, economic, and environmental impacts of casino gambling on the residents of Macau and Singapore

“…Those respondents who displayed higher levels of satisfaction with the environment usually held more positive attitudes toward casinos. Similar findings were reported by Perdue et al (1995) in South Dakota and Colorado, as well as by Carmichael et al (1996) in the Foxwoods Tribe.…”

“…Garrett (2004) also observed that casino operations do not promise to create local employment if they are established in rural or developing areas, where the workforces may be relatively unskilled, because these casinos are more likely to hire more skilled labor from outside instead of preferentially employing locals. A few studies have even indicated that the opening of a casino did not lead to any improvement or have any positive impact on recreation options (Carmichael et al, 1996;Long, 1996).…”

“…Moreover, the taxation of the casino industry has become a significant source of economic funds for Macau's government (Gu & Tam, 2011). Conversely, the unprecedented growth and expansion of the gambling industry have had many positive and negative economic, socio-cultural, and environmental impacts (Carmichael, Peppard, & Boudreau, 1996;Lee & Back, 2006). Of these impacts, the positive benefits (such as increases in earned incomes, improvement of social welfare, and consummation of public facilities) and the negative outcomes (e.g.…”

Life satisfaction and support for tourism development

“…Overall quality of life was measured with 6 items (Diener et al, 1985;Sirgy, 2002) Three questions were asked to measure residents' support for further tourism development. Residents were asked to indicate their level of agreement with the statements related to their support for further tourism development (Allen et al, 1993;Carmichael, Peppard, & Boudreau, 1996). Table 2 shows the correlation coefficient between those five constructs.…”

The impact of world heritage site designation on local communities – A case study of Ogimachi, Shirakawa-mura, Japan

“…Sirakaya, Teye and Sonmez (2002) state that, as Doxey's (1975) Irridex and Butler's (1980) Destination Life Cycle Model suggest, local people's attitudes towards tourism keep changing throughout various stages of tourism development; hence, an investigation of local communities' attitudes is important for community development. Local people's attitudes towards tourism are also vital for themselves, because they have few opportunities to express their opinions in the decision-making process (Carmichael, Peppard, & Boudreau, 1996). Andereck and Vogt (2000) consider that this importance is derived from the fact that it is the local people who ultimately decide which changes brought about by tourism are acceptable and which are not.…”