St. Nick’s, Chef Garces and the Pageant- Wednesday’s Roundup!

$4.325 Million
CRDA has agreed to chip in $4.325 million in hazard pay to ensure the Miss America Pageant will be held in Atlantic City this year, everyone reports. Kudos to Amy Kuperinski for linking to that image of the board of directors. Amy Rosenberg points out they denied a request for $50K to expand a community gardening project. I’m not mathemagician but $50K is $0.050 million, right? In related news, the governor of Texas says you should move there because the taxes are lower.

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Hard Rock, Taxes, Cognitive Dissonance — Tuesday’s Roundup!

Hard Rock’s going before the CRDA today to seek both preliminary and final site approval for their project to redo the Taj Mahal and does it seem weird to do preliminary and final at the same time? It seemed weird to Jim Kennedy – the former CRDA head – who tweeted, “I’m a big fan of Hard Rock Atlantic City. But, it’s just wrong for the CRDA to conduct a same day Preliminary & Final Site Plan approval process. The reason there is a two step process is it’s a deliberative process.” We called the CRDA spokespeople for comment, but they never get back to us. I wouldn’t get back to us either.

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Millionaires, Taxes and You – Thursday’s Roundup!

Taxing millionaires is supposed to chase them off to South Carolina, where they live together in a big mangrove swamp and swim in piles of money all day, but that’s not what actually happens according to this report, which alleges “even in New Jersey, migration of high-income taxpayers in response to ‘millionaire taxes’ has been relatively unimportant.”

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Profits Rise, Everything Else is Falling Apart – Tuesday’s Roundup!

Today’s big regional headline is a 22.5% increase in gross operating profit by Atlantic City’s casinos, which the A.P. calls “good news for the seaside gambling resort” and a “jackpot” for someone. Could have fooled me! Who are the six people left in Atlantic County who think casino profits still correlate with local happiness/security/contentment?

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He put the K. I. P. in Pic-a-Lilli

As devoted customers of the Pic-a-Lilli Pub in Atlantic City, we are sad to report that Kip is leaving as the manager, according to a FB post of his last week. Sorry we missed it, but the kids were on vacation. Also, due to budgetary concerns, Route 40 has had less disposable income to drop on tails (hot) on Friday nights, so we haven’t been in there so much. Kip–whose actual name is Pickett Russell IV–is one of the descendants of Pickett Russell Sr., who founded the original Pic-a-Lilli in on Route 206 in Shamong in the 1920s, according to that place’s website. In his FB post, he said there were “no hard feelings” and he hoped we–all of us, truly–would continue to enjoy the Pic.

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