Oswego reduces wait time for downtown businesses to apply for gaming license

The amount of time that new restaurants and nonprofit businesses in downtown Oswego have to wait before they can apply for a gaming license has been reduced from one year to six months.

At the April 8 Oswego Village Board meeting, Oswego Village President Ryan Kauffman and board trustees voted 4-3 to approve a code amendment to reduce the one year waiting period for downtown Oswego ancillary and nonprofit establishments to six months.

Voting “yes” was Kauffman along with village trustees Jennifer Jones Sinnott, Tom Guist and Kit Kuhrt.

“No” votes came from trustees Karin McCarthy-Lange, Karen Novy and Andrew Torres. McCarthy-Lange had previously voiced her opposition to changing the rules.

“The reason that we put the one year [restriction] in place is so that we would have restaurants that added gaming instead of being gaming places that served food,” she had said. “That was the whole reason. And I don’t see any reason to change that.”

In February 2024, the Oswego Village Board approved new rules to limit the number of establishments that can offer video gambling in order to control its spread. That includes requiring restaurants, bars and nonprofit businesses to be in business for a year before they can apply for a gaming license.

In explaining his vote, Kauffman said “the change that we made tonight is very, very minor.”

“It’s only in the downtown,” he said. “It only changes it from 12 to six months. It’s a very, very small tweak on that.”

Following that vote, Kauffman and board trustees voted 4-3 to give Nash Vegas Saloon in downtown Oswego a gaming license. Nash Vegas opened its doors in August 2024.

Voting “yes” was Kauffman along with Jones Sinnott, Guist and Kuhrt.

Voting “no” were McCarthy-Lange, Novy and Torres.

Earlier in the meeting, trustees voted unanimously to give the recently opened Freddie’s Off The Chain restaurant a gaming license. Freddie’s applied for a gaming license before the one-year requirement went into effect.

Since 2022, the village has received about $1.5 million in video gaming revenue. Of that amount, about $173,045 was generated from downtown businesses.

Last year alone, the village received $605,000 in video gaming revenue. Nash Vegas had asked the village to change its rules so it didn’t have to wait a year to obtain its gaming license

“Obviously, everybody understands that restaurants have been struggling for the last few years,” Nash Vegas owner Yonas Lagos said in addressing village trustees. “Post COVID, we haven’t fully recovered. And with our industry dealing with inflation and increasing labor wages, our fighting chances need to be improved by having gaming.”

In voting to support the change, Jones Sinnott said that Nash Vegas Saloon has become a destination point for people.

“There are a lot of people that are coming in on the weekends or they might just be traveling through or staying over for business purposes that are checking out Nash Vegas,” she said.

Guist said amending the rules could help in filling vacant spaces in the downtown, such as the space that previously housed Tap House Grill and the still vacant building that formerly housed Dairy Barn

“It can be to fill up a lot of our commercial space and more quickly bring a Friday night life to our town than what we have right now,” he said.