State Senator Anthony Petruccelli offered optimistic predictions for such controversial issues as

State Senator Anthony Petruccelli offered optimistic predictions for such controversial issues as funding the MBTA and mitigating the impacts of a Boston casino when he spoke with new constituents in Chinatown on Thursday.

Petruccelli, an East Boston Democrat, appeared at the monthly meeting of the Chinatown Coalition as part of a series of visits to introduce himself to the neighborhood. Under the state’s redistricting plan, Chinatown moves out of the Second Suffolk District, represented by Sonia Chang-Diaz, and into Petrucelli’s First Suffolk and Middlesex District.

“I know I have big shoes to fill in representing the community she served so well,” he said of Chang-Diaz. He pledged to support issues important to Chinatown and the wider Asian-American community, including home-rule petitions for bilingual ballots in Boston and access to affordable housing.

Petruccelli highlighted accomplishments from his five years in the State Senate and eight previous years in the Massachusetts House of Representatives, including auto-insurance reform that prevented insurers from using drivers’ credit scores as a factor in determining rates. He also spoke of current efforts to rein in the cost of health care for employers.

He said recent improvements in the economy, with the stock market rising and unemployment dropping, could make residents believe the years of tight state budgets were at an end. With unemployment still high and revenues below benchmarks, he said, it will be a while before the state is in the black.

“Things are doing better, without a doubt, but numbers are not there yet,” Petruccelli said.

In addition to unemployment, there is the issue of 100,000 available jobs in the state that lack qualified applicants. Petruccelli said there needs be more workforce training to align potential workers with jobs requiring greater technological skills.

A local businessman raised the issue of the state’s new gambling law and plans to build a casino at Suffolk Downs, in Petruccelli’s native East Boston.

The man said Asian Americans seem to have a special fondness for gambling, and as a result are disproportionately represented among those with gambling addictions. That problem, he said, is compounded by the large number of Asian-American gamblers who don’t speak English and are especially unlikely to seek treatment.

He asked for the state legislature to conduct a study about the social impacts and family problems created by gambling, with a special focus on the Asian-American community.

http://articles.boston.com/2012-03-08/yourtown/31136587_1_gambling-addictions-casino-asian-americans