![]() ![]() Kaehny described the Hochuls as part of “the Buffalo oligarchy,” which controls nearly all of the long-struggling Rust Belt town’s political and financial affairs. Sources told The Daily Beast it has unsuccessfully sought a major breakthrough in the New York City market ever since. Three years before Cuomo entered office, Delaware North fleetingly secured a state contract to operate hyper-profitable video slots at the legendary Aqueduct Racetrack in Queens-only to see the deal collapse amid the global financial meltdown. “"The next governor should not be involved in enriching their spouse, it’s that simple.”Īs Kaehny noted, Delaware North has spent $700,000 lobbying the state just since 2019, trying to increase its share of the state’s tightly-regulated, zero-sum gambling market. "It's unacceptable to have him as general counsel and her as governor,” said John Kaehny, executive director of the good government group Reinvent Albany. The looming potential for a conflict of interest between the governor-to-be and the company that has paid her husband well over a million dollars over the past three years already has riled ethics advocates in the notoriously corruption-plagued state. It is effectively the reincarnation of Chairman Jeremy Jacobs’ previous company, Emprise, which was convicted in the 1970s of helping the Mafia operate a hotel-casino in Las Vegas. Like many gambling outfits, Delaware North has something of a shady past. On Wednesday, the Buffalo News reported that the company had announced William Hochul will remain in his present position, even after his wife ascends to the state's top job. “It is being evaluated with her new role as governor, and it will be completed before she takes office,” said a spokesman, who declined to answer further questions or provide additional details.ĭelaware North did not respond to repeated requests for comment. But it is unclear how that process works, since the lieutenant governor’s only formal role at the moment is to handle parliamentary matters in the State Senate. Hochul’s team asserted that there is “already a recusal process in place” to keep away any conflicts of interest. ![]() She will also oversee all the major airports and transit hubs in New York City, and the implementation and expansion of the state’s new plan to license online sports gambling-growth opportunities Delaware North has long salivated over and lobbied for. ![]() She will also hold in her palm the New York State Thruway Authority and the state Office of Parks and Recreation, with which Delaware North has almost $50 million in long-term contracts to operate food and beverage concessions, all of which it will need to renew in the next two years while Hochul is in office. She will control the New York State Gaming Commission, which must sign off on any sales and acquisitions of betting facilities. Once behind the executive desk, Kathy Hochul could have a major impact on the company’s future earnings. Hochul, Cuomo’s soon-to-be successor in the governor’s mansion, is married to former federal prosecutor William Hochul-now general counsel and senior vice president at gambling and hospitality giant Delaware North. ![]() Kathy Hochul, for one Buffalo-based casino company, everything soon could be coming up aces. Andrew Cuomo’s impending departure and the rise of Lt. Between the brutality of the early COVID-19 pandemic and the unceremonious downfall of its accused sex pest governor, New York State has endured a run of bad luck lately. ![]()
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