New Jobs? You Can Bet On It

WILMINGTON - Keith Bewley stood in line at Delaware Park casino eagerly waiting to demonstrate that he had good vision, dexterity, and could count - essentials to being a table-games dealer.

"I'm a victim of the recession," said the currently unemployed Bewley, 28, of West Grove in Chester County, who took his place at the table, rubbed his hands together, and began stacking a pile of chips by color, one of the tests. He proceeded to the next round, where he shuffled a deck of cards, had an interview, and took a drug test.

He was among more than 200 job seekers Thursday hoping to land one of 300 dealer positions that Delaware Park wants to have filled by Memorial Day - the official arrival of table games in Delaware. Two job fairs at the casino last month attracted more than 900 applicants combined.

High unemployment helps explain the intense competition. The jobless rate in the Philadelphia metropolitan area, which includes northern Delaware and South Jersey, stood at 9.0 percent in January, the latest month for which a regional figure was available.

"We're getting a decent number of people," said Shannon DeLucia, vice president of human resources, who gave a presentation at the job fairs. "You have a lot of people out of work. But you also have a lot of buzz about table games coming to both states."

Meaning Delaware and Pennsylvania. Pennsylvania legalized table games earlier this year and is neck-and-neck in the hiring process for dealers - creating a frenetic scene throughout both states.

Harrah's Chester Casino & Racetrack in Delaware County, 25 miles north of Delaware Park on I-95, held its first job fair to fill 500 table-games positions last Monday. Despite rain, 365 applicants showed up to become dealers, supervisors, and assistant shift managers.

The casino is holding additional job fairs this month: on Friday, 4 to 8 p.m.; and March 30, 11 a.m. to 3 p.m.

To date, 10 of the 12 licensed facilities have filed petitions with the Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board to add tables. Two casinos - Mohegan Sun at Pocono Downs, and Parx in Bensalem - were approved Tuesday. The other eight are in the process.

All are in the midst of hosting job fairs. Mount Airy Casino Resort held one in January - less than three weeks after table-games legislation passed in Harrisburg.

Besides getting petition approval, the Pennsylvania casinos must gain approval for staffing levels and floor plans from the state gaming board, and satisfy board regulations and other conditions. And the board will have to conduct background investigations on all new hires, as well as hire and train its own staff of regulators for table games.

"The board and the casinos still have a tremendous amount of work in front of them before the public will be able to enjoy table games," said Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board Chairman Greg Fajt. "Everyone is working well together to move this process along, but the expectation is that it will still take three to six more months until table games are operating."

That has not prevented any casino from moving full steam ahead on getting its own army of dealers ready.

Harrah's Chester began running local newspaper ads seeking dealers three weeks ago, hoping to get a large number of applicants from Chester and other parts of Delaware County. The casino is offering its own dealer schooling for free.

It hopes to open with 86 table games, including craps, roulette, mini-baccarat, blackjack, and pai gow, and a 25-table poker room by summer.

"The seriousness and desire with which the applicants approached the process was refreshing," said Robert Guidice, vice president of table games at Harrah's Chester, who worked last week's fair. "Many great candidates came through and were processed."

Guidice is among those that Pennsylvania has plucked from Atlantic City. He was table-games director at Showboat until Harrah's Chester hired him last month. Both are owned by Harrah's Entertainment Inc.

He said he was looking forward to influencing careers - this time in Pennsylvania.

"It's my top priority. As we look to bring table games to the forefront of Pennsylvania, I want to make sure the folks we hire are the best," Guidice said.

Atlantic City stands to lose workers to Delaware as well.

A billboard prominently placed on the outbound side of the Atlantic City Expressway teases the arrival of table games at Delaware Park. The casino wants to begin offering poker by Memorial Day, with other table games, including blackjack and craps, three weeks later.

To do that, it needs to hire 50 dealers with experience and an additional 250 part-time and full-time dealers new at the job, DeLucia said.

"We're bringing a new endeavor here," she said. "We don't have Delawareans with experience."

Complicating the shortage, she said, was that "we're all competing for a limited employee base."

That is why enrolling applicants in dealer school was critical in increasing the pool to draw from, she said, and why representatives from Delaware Technical and Community College were on hand at all three Delaware Park job fairs to register applicants. About 150 have enrolled in dealer courses at Del-Tech.

Among them was Bewley, job applicant number 1065.

"I'm pumped," said Bewley, who was laid off last April from his shipping-industry job, and whose unemployment benefits run out in less than two months.

DeLucia said wages would be competitive. Dealers make $5 to $7 an hour on average in Atlantic City, and an additional $15 to $21 in tips per hour, depending on their shift and whether they are part-time or full-time.

Not surprisingly, applicants with table-games experience, like Robert Mims, 56, a pit boss at Wheeling Casino in Wheeling, W.Va., are a hot commodity these days.

The West Philadelphia native visits Philadelphia every two weeks to see his mother, wife, three children, and extended family, who all live in West Philadelphia. He said the arrival of table games in Delaware and Pennsylvania was his ticket to return home.

"There will never be another time like this for me," Mims said. "It's just a matter of . . . who makes the right offer."

Mims, a 21-year veteran of the industry who also has worked in Atlantic City, Missouri, and Michigan, began sending resumes in November, two months before table games passed in Pennsylvania.

Since January, he has interviewed with Delaware Park and applied at the two other Delaware racetracks, Harrington Raceway, and Dover Downs. He has mailed resumes to SugarHouse, Parx, and Harrah's Chester.

Last week, he interviewed for a table-games managerial job at Hollywood Casino near Harrisburg and at Sands Casino Resort in Bethlehem.

This week, he has interviews lined up with Meadows Racetrack & Casino near Pittsburgh and Charles Town Races & Slots in West Virginia - which recently expanded to add table games and hopes to have them operating by fall.