Wednesday June 17, 2025

After 33 years of providing exemplary hospitality services to residents, businesses, and charitable organizations throughout the Central Pennsylvania region, it is with a heavy heart, a profound sense of pride, and immeasurable gratitude to our community that I am announcing the closing of The Casino at Lakemont Park and its affiliate Snappy Chef effective Monday, July 7, 2025.

The Casino has been my home, my love and my passion since I moved to Altoona in 1992, turning this now 135-year-old historic building into a thriving event and catering business dream. Unfortunately, in every dream there are realities we must face, and in our 33-year history we have endured our share.

As a tenant only, and not the owner of this building, and without any financial support from local government or development entities, I have invested my own personal finances to expand, renovate, repair and maintain this continuously aging structure. Yet despite its location on county owned grounds, a qualifying criterion of the current local Hotel and Bed Tax agreement, The Casino has continually been excluded from receiving any of the Hotel & Bed Tax revenues that have served to support and substantially pay down debts on similar facilities in the area.

I've long been a vocal opponent of the inequities in the distribution of local Hotel and Bed Tax revenues. Over the years, our County Commissioners, in conjunction with our Tourism Marketing Organizations (AMCVB and Explore Altoona) adopted and reworked Hotel and Bed Tax agreements to benefit The Blair County Convention Center, The Blair County Ballpark and other entities located on county grounds. While their debts were paid down using Hotel and Bed Tax dollars, the value and historical significance of The Casino, as an asset to this community, was overlooked and ignored, with our debts remaining our responsibility to this day.

Despite that seemingly insurmountable hurdle, The Casino continued providing exceptional services to our clients and the community. Our team overcame the devastation of COVID; we fought the ongoing battle to hire qualified, reliable staff; we've endured market volatility and radical price inflation on most every product we purchase for our business; and despite increasing competition in the catering business in our region, we continued to be the venue of choice for so many of you. We simply couldn't continue doing this on our own.

There are not enough words to express my sincerest appreciation to our incredibly talented and dedicated staff, to our clients, vendors and to all of you who have supported The Casino all these years. Be assured that we will be contacting any clients affected by this announcement to provide any necessary arrangements or assistance for those few who have outstanding reservations.

Perhaps there is a bright future for The Casino at Lakemont Park. Together with our landlord, The Lakemont Partnership, we have contacted several businesses that might assume control of our business operations. Until then, my hope is that the people of position and authority in our community will recognize the importance of what we have built, see the void that will be left by our departure, and finally embrace a plan to support the continuance of its history within our community.

Serving you all these years has been an absolute pleasure. I want to thank all of you. I'll miss you, and I wish you all the best.

Doug Simon
Chef & Owner of DJS Food Designs, Inc.
The Casino at Lakemont Park & Snappy Chef Catering

If you are interested in event room rentals, please contact Christi@lakemontparkfun.com.

More coming soon!