A big talking point of opponents of slots at Arundel Mills is: Let's put slots at Laurel Park raceway instead of Arundel Mills. Then Anne Arundel County can still get the slots revenue and the casino will be where gambling already happens. Mall-slots opponents want, as the ads say, "to put slots in a better location in Anne Arundel County, Laurel Park."
After
The Constitutional amendment permitting Maryland slots in certain locations specifies one of the locations as: "(I) ANNE ARUNDEL COUNTY, WITHIN 2 MILES OF MD
ROUTE 295;"
But activists who live in the Russett neighborhood, near Laurel Park, say that the racetrack is not within two miles of Route 295. Slots at the track aren't allowed under the Constitution, they say.
They may have a case. True, the race course is within two miles of the Baltimore-Washington Parkway, also known as 295. But the portion of the road near Laurel is under federal, not state control, so you could argue that it's not really "MD Route 295." According to the Maryland State Highway Administration, the state owns and maintains the road from the Baltimore City line in the north to just past the intersection with Maryland Route 175 in the south. (That's more than 4 miles from Laurel Park, according to Google Earth.) After that, says SHA spokesman Charles Gischlar, "the federal government picks it up."
What's more, below 175 and extending through Anne Arundel County, there are no signs on the road designating it as "295," Gischlar says.
What's the road called as it passes Laurel?, I asked National Park Service spokesman Jeffrey Olson. "As far as I know we call it the Baltimore-Washington Parkway," he said.
"I completely understand that I'm splitting hairs here," says Joe Franco, who's on the board of the Russett homeowner association and is trying to draw attention to the federal status of the parkway near Laurel Park.
Maybe, but it looks like the law could
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