Province to hand over Sault casino operations in May

The casino's new owners will take over in May, says OLG.

Gateway Casinos, based in Burnaby, B.C., was awarded the contract for the Northern Bundle, which includes existing sites in Sault Ste. Marie, Sudbury and Thunder Bay, as well as new locations in North Bay and Kenora.

Jake Pastore, the Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corp.'s director of municipal and community relations, said Wednesday that Gateway is in a 120- to 180-day transition period right now as it prepares to move in.

"Sometime in May we actually give them the keys to all the different sites," Pastore said, during a stop in Sudbury.

There are currently 270 employees at the local casino.

Under terms of the new 20-year agreement reached, Gateway must retain current staffing levels for the first 12 months after taking over management of the casino.

Mayor Christian Provenzano has said he 'has every expectation' that the new operator will continue to employ the 'great employee base' that exists at the site. The mayor has said he hopes to see a significant investment in the 'fairly dated' casino.

Gateway has so far not publicly revealed its plans for the Sault site.

The Sault casino opened in 1998 as a 'temporary' site and, at that time, council was informed by the province that a permanent casino would be located here when there was a solid business case for it.

Based in western Canada, Gateway has more than 4,000 employees and operates 18 gambling properties, with 220 tables and over 6,700 slot machines.

With its business partners, Gateway operates 43 restaurants and 1,000 hotel rooms.

with files from Sudbury.com