Jeff Messer’s recent guest column in The Current advises Scarborough residents to consider “the potential financial benefits to the town” before spurning the racetrack’s most recent “promise” of $8 million a year to allow slots at their facility.

“The fact is,” he writes, “we could build $50 million in new school buildings, a community center with a pool; the public safety complex and still have $3 million annually remaining from the funds generated by this project to lower the tax rate.”

At first glance, he presents a good argument. Yet, in reality, this essay cries out for a more rigorous analysis in at least three different areas.

First is that it focuses on only one half of an out-of-balance equation. It asks voters to look at some possible benefits of this $8 million, but pretty much ingnores the certain – and equally important – drawbacks.

All this cash coming into the town’s coffers is seen only as “income.” The “costs” that come with it are not factored in. Doesn’t that seem a bit shortsighted? We all know “income” is nice, but no matter how much the income is, if it doesn’t cover one’s expenses, you end up in trouble.

Nor does the article explain where all that money is going to come from in the first place. The presumption is that this will be new money that no one around here had previously – possibly from tourists. Have they not been through a Maine winter?) Yet if all this money is not “new,” if it comes mostly from people in the “neighborhood,” if it’s money that would otherwise be going to the local barber, baker or restaurateur, then how does the local economy benefit?

Related to this point, and underlying nearly every sentence of the piece, is an assumption that introducing slots in town would do no great harm. I ask, “How can one know that slots are harmless?”

It’s not that data is unavailable. Enough studies have been done to bury the racetrack under a mound of reports six feet high. Nor, if we look at Hollywood Slots, is it that the Gambling Control Board hasn’t ever suggested that such a “cost-benefit analysis” be undertaken.

It’s simply that, in order to determine the full extent of the “costs,” one would need unfettered access to all of Bangor’s records – something we all know is not about to happen.

The inducement of so much “easy money” must certainly pull strongly upon any public official saddled with the necessity of figuring out how to pay for major projects with limited resources. That leads to the second problem with this article.

You see, when this same issue was discussed a few years ago, Jeff Messer’s take on the matter was, “The character of this town is not up for sale.” But, today, it appears that it is for sale.

“In 2003, the estimated annual revenues to the town would have been $550,000” he states. Clearly, that wasn’t enough for him back then. These days, apparently, $8 million is. At the very least, it’s worth looking at now. And, who knows. He and the other councilors just may be able to “negotiate this number significantly higher.” (Does that mean he knows something the rest of us don’t?)

Such talk, in my mind, leaves no doubt that there is some price at which Jeff is willing to vote in favor of slots, some price at which he can be convinced that it is a good idea to create a dependency upon gambling to fund the town’s most basic services: the education of our youth, the health needs of our seniors, even its public safety requirements.

I find that extremely disconcerting

My third objection is that the $8 million figure is just a guesswork number, no more credible than the $550,000 was in 2003. The idea that slots revenues ebb and flow – and that they’re ebbing big time these days – is not dealt with. And what exactly is that $8 million? Is it supposed to be “free” or a “gift” above and beyond any other payments that any other developer would be expected to pay? Not very likely, but we don’t yet know.

If that property were developed – without including slots – wouldn’t the assessed value come to at least $6 million or more? Wouldn’t the town, then, be selling its soul, not for $8 million, but rather a paltry 2 million pieces of silver, or even much less if you add back those hidden costs?

I feel that Jeff is wrong to think that it’s OK to fund the town’s expenses in this distasteful way. I ask him and the other residents of Scarborough: Is this the way to pay for the scheduled new school buildings? Is this the right funding mechanism for “that community center with a pool?” Or that public safety complex that would “meet the needs of the community for the next century?”

In Dover, Del., Penn National, the wallet behind all of the Downs’ promises, already buys police cars for that community. Some people there think that’s just fine. But in Scarborough, the cop on the beat won’t even let you buy him a cup of coffee, let alone a new car. He’s trained not to accept it. Isn’t that the way life is supposed to be?

Scarborough doesn’t need slots to provide its citizens with a quality lifestyle.

Fred Kilfoil, who lives in Portland, is a former Scarborough resident and business owner.