The move from river to land for the Davenport casino took another step Thursday. Iowa Racing and Gaming administrator, Brian Ohorilko, says the sale of the Rhythm City riverboat casino was finalized. “The commission did approve the asset purchase by the Scott County Casino group,” Ohorilko says.
The Scott County group is led by developer Dan Kehl, who also owns the Riverside Golf Resort and Casino. Ohorilko says the next step would be approving the site for the land-based casino. He says they would expect the land-based proposal to come forward at a later date.
Kehl says the unanimous vote by the commission was a huge relief. “It’s a little bit surreal to finally be standing in front of the commission and saying ‘hey we’ve got this thing done so now we are ready to move forward to the next step’,” Kehl says. His tentative plans call for closing the purchase, and taking possession of the Davenport boat, on February 3rd. The casino would then close for two days to install new computer equipment and software, and reopen February 5th.
Kehl hopes to then get approval to break ground in the fall along Interstate 80, for a new $110-million-dollar casino on land. The new casino would take about one year to build.