a day of frenzied, behind-the-scenes wrangling, secret vote counts, and last-minute deals, House Speaker Salvatore F. DiMasi orchestrated a narrow committee vote yesterday against Governor Deval Patrick's resort casino proposal, setting up certain defeat today by the full House of one of the governor's cornerstone economic initiatives.

The committee vote was closer than had been expected as recently as last week, as senators and Republicans on the committee swung the governor's way over the final two days. After an initial vote yesterday produced a tie and a parliamentary dispute, House leaders delayed a final vote for four hours, which gave them time to come up with something more decisive.

Ultimately, DiMasi engineered the 10-to-8 vote against Patrick's plan by changing the vote of a Republican House member, Richard J. Ross of Wrentham, at literally the last minute. After the intense arm-twisting and DiMasi's victory, the only question for today was how badly Patrick's bill will be defeated in the House.

"I can count," Patrick said last night, acknowledging the inevitable. "I can count."

Over the day, Beacon Hill was gripped by a series of confusing events played out behind closed doors. Two votes were taken by e-mail and phone yesterday and counted in House and Senate offices instead of committee rooms, after members of the Joint Committee on Economic Development and Emerging Technologies heard 13 hours of testimony Tuesday.

The vote means that when the House convenes today, it will be deciding whether to uphold or overturn the committee's negative recommendation. Overturning a committee recommendation is unusual, and DiMasi has vowed it will not happen in this instance. The Senate has generally been considered in favor of the bill.

Source:http://www.casinonews.org/