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The Galesi Group and Chicago-based Rush Street Gaming are banking that a casino on the Mohawk River will do for Schenectady what another major riverfront casino has done for Pittsburgh.

On Tuesday, Rush Street Chairman Neil Bluhm showed a crowd inside Proctors GE Theatre a splashy video celebrating the fifth anniversary of Pittsburgh's Rivers Casino, its more than 1,800 employees and support for area charities and organizations, including the NAACP.

"We're going to take an old site that's just been sitting there fallow," said Bluhm of the 60-acre former ALCO site owned by Galesi where the partners are hoping to build a casino as part of a $150 million retail and residential development.

"It's going to get improved and it's going to be something you're going to have fun with, you're going to take pride with," Bluhm said, touting its job creation and tax revenues.

Mayor Gary McCarthy called the Rivers Casino at Mohawk Harbor "transformative," and Schenectady County Chamber of Commerce President Chuck Steiner lauded Galesi and Rush Street as a "powerhouse combination."

The proposal for the former ALCO brownfield includes a harbor with a 50-boat slip and dock, a casino and 250-room hotel and a movie and television studio.

Galesi Group COO David Buicko said the project and Rush Street partnership "could be a game changer" for the city and county in terms of economic growth, employment and entertainment.

Buicko elicited a chorus of laughter from the audience when he joked that for all Rush Street's lofty accomplishments and $50 billion in development projects, "teaming up with the Galesi won't hurt you either."

Buicko said he visited the casino in Pittsburgh this past weekend, and "The caliber and quality of people that are working for Rush Street Gaming are the ones we want in Schenectady."

Despite the hoopla at Proctors Tuesday, Buicko and the other speakers offered few details about the construction costs, size, and number of construction and permanent jobs Rivers Casino at Mohawk Harbor might bring to the region.

Bluhm, a lawyer and certified public account-turned-casino developer, said that he likes everything on the development front taking place in the Electric City.

"We've done business in a lot of places, but when we saw Mohawk Harbor right on the river, we immediately said this is a terrific site with great potential, and that Schenectady was right for us," he said. "And when we visited downtown and saw all that was happening, we really felt encouraged."

If the project receives state backing, Mohawk Harbor would join the other Rush Street casinos in Niagara Falls, Philadelphia, Des Plaines, Ill., near Chicago, and Canada along with Pittsburgh.

He said his company approaches every project with three goals: to be an economic success that drives the economy, to be a good neighbor in the community and to be a great place to work.

"As a real estate developer, we build something that fits into the community. We're not just a casino developer and operator, and I feel very strongly that the Rivers casino will be something Schenectady will be very proud of," Bluhm said.

He said that crime around the Rush Street casinos has gone down and company officials are vigilant when it comes to addressing gambling addiction, which he conceded is a legitimate issue.

County Legislature Chairman Tony Jasenski said the casino "is poised to become a key building block in our local economy and is one the Schenectady County Legislature wholeheartedly supports."

He said the casino and gaming management program at Schenectady County Community College in tandem with the Rivers Casino would provide "incredible opportunities" for area youngsters seeking a viable career option.

Afterwards, Buicko sounded that same theme when he talked about linking disadvantaged inner city youngsters with programs like those offered as SCCC as a pathway to jobs in the gaming industry.

One key to getting a casino license is speed to market.

Asked how the Schenectady proposal compares with others vying for a casino license in the Capital Region, Buicko said, "We have the most shovel-ready project."

In June, Galesi and Rush Street are expected to seek the required approval from city zoning and planning officials.

With its required state Environmental Quality Review Act studies already in hand, the Galesi project figures to have an advantage over the competition.

Buicko said an obsolete nuclear reactor long-used by Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute that is to be decommissioned, is expected to be removed from the fringe of the project site and could be dressed up to look like a light house.

"We're not overly cocky or overly confident, but we feel we'll have the best project," said Bluhm.

The announcement in Schenectady comes on the heels of a presentation Monday by representatives of Saratoga Casino and Raceway and Churchill Downs Inc. to put a $300 million casino off Thompson Hill Road in East Greenbush.

Other sites under consideration are at Thruway Exit 23 in Albany, at Howe's Caverns in Schoharie County and in Montgomery County.

A Hudson River site in the city of Rensselaer is also under discussion but nothing solid has yet been announced.

James Odato contributed.

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