Sands Bethlehem expects US$190m expansion
The facility acquired by an Alabama tribe will enjoy a US$190 million hotel expansion.
US.- Wind Creek Hospitality, an affiliate of the Poarch Band of Creek Indians of Alabama, acquired last year the Sands Bethlehem casino in Pennsylvania. Executives from the company talked about their plans to invest US$190 million into a 300-room hotel expansion.
The executives talked to lehighvalleylive.com this week at the Sands Casino Resort Bethlehem as part of a series of meetings with local news outlets, and marked the first time that the tribe affiliate publicly talked about the casino since the purchase was announced on March 8, 2018.
Once the sale is approved by the Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board (PGCB), Wind Creek Hospitality is planning to invest US$190 million into the 124-acre former Bethlehem Steel plant, in order to spend US$90 million to build another 300-room hotel tower with event space. The new tower, expected to be open in two years, would be perpendicular to the existing hotel in the parking lot.
Sands Bethlehem President and COO Brian Carr, who will continue in that position after the sale, said that there are no plans to follow through on a US$90 million gaming floor expansion that Sands started and then stopped.
The company is planning an expansion as the hotel is consistently at 95% ocuppancy, and with 300 more rooms and extra meeting space, the tribe would be able to attract bigger conventions and public.
The remaining US$100 million are set to be destined to the No. 2 Machine Shop with a “non-gaming amenity,” and an indoor water park is one of the possibilities.
