Atlantic County Collects $15 Million Settlement From Casino Taxes Lawsuit
Posted on: July 24, 2025, 04:49h.
Last updated on: July 24, 2025, 09:56h.
- Atlantic County has received $15 million from New Jersey
- The money is to make the county whole over casino property taxes
- The state allowed the casinos to pay less tax through a 2021 law
Atlantic County Executive Dennis Levinson says his office is in receipt of $15 million from the State of New Jersey.
Atlantic County sued the state after lawmakers in 2021 amended how the nine casinos in Atlantic City pay their annual property taxes. The PILOT, or payment-in-lieu-of-taxes, program that has afforded the casinos to pay an annual assessment based on how much gaming revenue they won in the prior year was altered four years ago to remove iGaming and online sports betting from the calculation.
Atlantic County successfully argued that the 2021 amendment violated a 2018 consent order that resulted from its lawsuit challenging the initiation of PILOT through the Casino Property Tax Stabilization Act. The consent was the outcome of state judges concluding that PILOT unfairly burdened other municipalities within Atlantic County for the benefit of Atlantic City casinos.
The consent raised the county’s allocation of PILOT funds from 10.4% to 13.5%.
Successful Yet Costly Litigation
Atlantic County has spent years in the court system contesting the PILOT program. Levinson told Casino.org in April that it’s cost the county more than $1 million “to fight all these years.”
We fought for more than seven years to make our county taxpayers whole,” Levinson said in a release. “With this settlement, Atlantic County will have received close to $59 million more than it would have had we not challenged the state over the PILOT legislation.”
The $15 million from the state makes the county whole for what it should have received had the New Jersey Legislature not amended the Atlantic City casino PILOT in 2021 to remove iGaming and mobile sports revenue from the tax computation.
We were ripped off,” Levinson told Casino.org. “All this did was bring us back to where we should be.”
Levinson said that as the casinos and Atlantic City paid less in state and county taxes, the remaining 22 municipalities paid more to make up the difference.
“Despite numerous delays by the state, the Board of County Commissioners and I persevered. And our perseverance has paid off for the benefit of all of our taxpayers,” Levinson declared.
Levinson Seeks PILOT Landing
Levinson told Casino.org that he knows of no other casino market where gaming businesses pay property taxes based on their casino revenue.
Every single entity in the country, and possibly the world, that has casino gaming, has figured out a way to assess property taxes. Why is it that only in Atlantic City that we can’t get an accurate assessment on the casinos, and we need a PILOT?” Levinson pondered.
The Casino Property Tax Stabilization Act came after five casinos in Atlantic City closed between 2014 and 2016, and the remaining properties began disputing their assessed valuations. To keep a continuous flow of tax money to the state, county, and city government lawmakers in Trenton agreed to PILOT.
Almost a decade later, Levinson says the city has stabilized and PILOT is no longer needed. In a letter to state Sen. Vince Polistina (R-Atlantic), who in February suggested that PILOT “continue in perpetuity,” Levinson called the state lawmaker’s stance “astonishing.”
“I fail to comprehend why other states with casino gaming have been able to assess casino properties without the need for a PILOT that results in our taxpayers paying more. Why is this unique to New Jersey? Why is the NJ Legislature unable to provide a mechanism for proper tax assessments of casinos without putting the burden on our hardworking families who already contend with the highest state taxes in the country?” Levinson asked Polistina.
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