ALBANY — One of Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo’s signature initiatives, the expansion of gambling in New York, took a major step forward on Wednesday, when a state board recommended the approval of Las Vegas-style resort casinos in the Catskills, near Albany and on the northern end of the Finger Lakes.

The resorts, which would include boutique hotels, spas, luxury restaurants, golf resorts and other amenities, are expected to provide thousands of jobs in distressed parts of the state and, according to one estimate, generate over $300 million in new tax revenues.

But New York is entering an intensively competitive gambling industry in the Northeast with lagging returns that some analysts believe is close to saturated. The Gaming Facility Location Board seemed to take that into account by declining to recommend a fourth resort, as allowed by law, in part to give the other three a better chance of success. It also rejected six applications in Orange County, the region closest to New York City, in favor of a single resort in neighboring Sullivan County, to the north, citing the need for economic development.

For advocates, the announcement on Wednesday was a cause for celebration, after years of intense lobbying for full-scale gambling as a salve for economic woes in the long-faded Catskills.