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WILMINGTON — A Cleveland-based group wants to build a $600 million casino resort off Interstate 71 in Clinton County.

Promoters of the casino, hotel and restaurant to be built on 94 acres near the Ohio 73 exit, are expected to propose ballot language for a statewide constitutional amendment legalizing a single casino during a meeting Wednesday with Clinton County Commissioners.

Brad Pressman and Rick Lertzman of My Ohio Now have met twice with commissioners to discuss the project.

"This will be the first time we will see anything in writing," County Administrator Mark Brooker said.

My Ohio Now hopes the plan to build a single casino in Clinton County and split 90 percent of about $170 million in anticipated annual revenues between Ohio's other 87 counties will overcome opposition that has defeated several ballot issues that would have expanded gambling in Ohio, most recently November 2006.

Last November, voters turned down a proposal that would have permitted 31,500 slot machines at seven Ohio racetracks and two Cleveland sites. It was the third defeat in 16 years of issues that would have expanded gambling in Ohio. Voters also rejected casino issues in 1990 and 1996 by 3-to-2 margins.

"There's a dramatic change in what voters have experienced," said Pressman, citing data on surveys on www.myohionow.com.

Casinos have opened in other Midwestern states. The Clinton County casino resort, on land where a cheese barn is now located, would be a state-of-the art facility with "Midwestern sensibilities," Lertzman and Pressman said.

Gov. Ted Strickland's office was unfamiliar with My Ohio Now's plan. "That said, the governor does not support any expansion of gambling in Ohio," spokesman Keith Dailey said.