‘It couldn’t come at a worse time’: Legislature strips casino mitigation funds amid municipal budget woes

 

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‘It couldn’t come at a worse time’: Legislature strips casino mitigation funds amid municipal budget woes     December 5, 2025 By HALLIE CLAFLIN

For the second year in a row, the Legislature has directed gaming revenue used for mitigating the local impacts of casinos into its own coffers, leaving city and town leaders frustrated amid worsening municipal budget strains.

The move falls in line with the Legislature’s penny-pinching efforts to alleviate state budget pressures amid a host of federal funding claw backs nearly a year into the second Trump administration. Gateway Cities with budgets already nearing a breaking point will now lose out on funds they have used for nearly a decade for projects that address the adverse local impacts of casinos, such as increased crime, traffic, and regional gambling addiction.

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The Community Mitigation Fund (CMF), established in 2015 and used to award millions of dollars in grants to municipalities that host a casino or are next to a community that does, normally receives 6.5 percent of the annual revenues collected from a tax on casinos.

In the 2025 state budget, lawmakers allowed a temporary redirection of those gaming revenues – a move Gov. Maura Healey branded as a one-time maneuver to free up $100 million for state spending during a tight budget year. But the 2026 state budget saw the Legislature again redirect the funds to priorities like transportation, education, economic development, and tourism.

“Retrospectively, I think that's when we should have really voiced concern that they're touching the money at all,” Springfield’s chief development officer Tim Sheehan said in an interview. “From the Legislature's standpoint – we did it once and we didn't have any pushback, therefore, we're going to take it again.”

With funding for the CMF now stalled for two consecutive years, the Massachusetts Gaming Commission will use the small remainder of the funds – around $5 million – to award grants for fiscal year 2027. Those allocations will be significantly smaller than the ones in previous years, leaving the mitigation fund to run out of money unless funding is restored.

The gaming commission has awarded nearly $80 million in grants from the CMF to eligible municipalities and entities since 2015. In 2024, the total amount awarded was approximately $22 million. Eight Gateway Cities are eligible for the funding, including Everett, Chelsea, Revere, Malden, and Lynn, because of their proximity to the Encore Boston Harbor casino in Everett, as well as Springfield, Holyoke, and Chicopee, because of the MGM Springfield casino.

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More Context Municipal budgets at the breaking point (November 2025)  ‘No margin for error’: State economic check-in spotlights tricky balancing act (September 2025)

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