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A New York State board on Wednesday recommended approving the opening of a casino resort in the Southern Tier, a rural and economically impoverished area where similar bids were previously rejected.

Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo faced a political firestorm last year when the area, struggling for decades with high unemployment and a declining population, was not among those selected for a gambling resort. This year, the governor asked the state board to reopen bidding specifically for the Southern Tier.The sole proposal came from Jeffrey Gural, the New York City real estate investor and owner of the Tioga Downs racetrack, who submitted plans that had been rejected in the first round.His revised $195 million plan calls for expanding Tioga Downs, in Nichols, N.Y., into a full-fledged casino. It would include 1,000 slot machines and 50 blackjack and roulette tables, as well as a 161-room hotel, six restaurants and an outdoor performance center. Kevin Law, chairman of the three-member Gaming Facility Location Board, said that the new proposal offered a better financial plan than bids submitted in the initial round, and that the casino was likely to bring new jobs, economic development, additional tax revenue and tourism to the area.If the project gets final approval, Tioga Downs would become the fourth casino resort developed outside New York City under the governor’s push to expand gambling in the state. There are also nine electronic slot machine parlors at nine racetracks.“It’s a good day for the Southern Tier,” said Mr. Gural, who also thanked the board and the governor after the news was announced.Kevin Engelbert, the town supervisor in Nichols, agreed.Nichols sits on the state’s southern border with Pennsylvania, midway between Binghamton and Elmira. Southern Tier residents have watched in despair as IBM, a shoe company and other manufacturers closed over the years and local farms collapsed.“This could be a huge step in our recovery, economically and socially,” Mr. Engelbert said on Wednesday. “We’ve had a hard time maintaining our population base.”Yet economists and analysts believe the Northeast is already saturated with about five dozen gambling halls and casinos. The competition for customers is becoming even more fierce.In Atlantic City, where five casinos closed last year, gambling revenues have fallen by half since 2006. While the casino business in Pennsylvania now appears to be flattening out, the Foxwoods and Mohegan Sun casinos in Connecticut also face declining revenues. The state is looking at opening another gambling operation in the Hartford area as a $850 million MGM casino is planned for Springfield, Mass., just across Connecticut’s northern border.In New York, gambling revenues at electronic slot machine parlors, located at nine racetracks, have fallen 3 percent this year. Revenues are expected to fall further as the full-scale casinos open, especially in more sparsely populated upstate areas.New York approved plans in December for a $750 million resort casino near Monticello in the Catskills and a $300 million casino in Schenectady. In expanding gambling in New York, Mr. Cuomo, a Democrat, hoped to capture some of an estimated $1 billion a year spent by New Yorkers at out-of-state casinos.Although the board expressed concern about cannibalization, it also approved plans for a $425 million gambling hall in the Finger Lakes that estimates that half the casino’s revenue will come from slot parlors in nearby Farmington and Batavia and the Oneida Indian Nation’s Turning Stone casino.But the state board rejected the proposals, including one from Mr. Gural, in the Southern Tier. At the same time, the state decided against authorizing natural gas fracking in the region, dashing hopes of a revival.Mr. Gural committed to investing $138 million in the project, on top of the $57 million he has already put into Tioga Downs. He also pledged $1.5 million a year for nonprofit organizations in the Southern Tier.Mr. Law noted that 50 people spoke at a public hearing about the Tioga Downs proposal, all of them in support.“We heard the community loud and clear,” Mr. Law said. “We know they’re struggling.”