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#1
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![]() I was just curious how the govenor of Ohio can have an executive order for slots but Kentucky's govenor cannot? Does it have something to do with a particular states constitution?
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#2
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![]() Bribes.
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#3
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![]() I am not certain in Kentucky, but here is an overview of how it went down in Ohio...
First off, there was a great deal of bickering on who has the power to authorize VLT's in the state. The 1973 Constitutional Amendment for the Ohio Lottery authorizes the General Assembly to establish an agency of the state to manage lottery games to support education programs in Ohio. The General Assembly has already authorized the Ohio Lottery to run such games. Now, the question comes on what are "lottery games". The State of Delaware, in 1993, decided that "lottery" meant more to risking money on chance games rather than picking numbers or scratching tickets. They determined that "lottery" could mean a video screen as the device and that the machine is centrally controlled, as opposed to a slot machine, which is independently controlled by the device, and it would still be a lottery. The move was followed in several other states, like New York, adding divisions to their lottery commission to run the Video Lottery Terminals, and pretty much all of them have held up in court. Did the voters in Ohio mean machines that look, sound, and act like slot machines when they voted in the "lottery". I doubt it, but it has legally stood up in several other states and probably will in Ohio. So now the state is in need of serious money to tune of around $3.2 billion over the next 2 years. The state could fill the hole by cutting services pretty drastically or raising taxes, both of which are serious marks on your record when you are trying to get re-elected. Or, they can finally realize that billions of dollars are leaving the state and turning into tax revenues at casinos in Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Michigan, and Indiana, and finally open up their own casinos in Ohio. But again, who has the power to authorize the games? The legislature, mainly the Senate and their Republican President Bill Harris, have stood firm that the Assembly has already done what they need to do when they developed the lottery commission years ago and that the Democratic Governor must expand it from there. (Ironically the Republican Senate did vote in favor of Instant Racing a couple of years ago, and the Governor at that time denounced the idea, and now both sides have flipped on the idea). The Democratic Governor has been wanting the legislature to authorize the machines, mostly because he knows that the racetracks cannot get the loans for millions of dollars if this is done just by the Governor, mainly because the state is pretty unimpressed with Governor Strickland and will quite possibly vote him and his executive order for VLT's out of office in 2010. So, as in most great negotiations go, everyone walks away from the table a little unhappy. Ohio has cut services, although not as much as they had originally intended, the Governor has authorized VLT's through an executive order focusing on his Lottery Director to establish rules and a plan to implement the VLT's in Ohio, and the legislature has voted to accept his plan, giving it a weak-but-present legislative approval. In the end, what will happen is that about half of the proceeds from the VLT's, the money remaining after the wins are paid out to the players, will go to the state, which will direct this money to education and other money away from education. In the end, no real new money is going to education, but that is basically the only way to solve the budget issues in Ohio. I am still hearing either 4% or 10% of revenues from the VLT's will go towards "racing enhancements", i.e. purse enhancements, although not necessarily. Depending on whether your are a racing supporter or a racetrack supporter determines which number you like, but all of it is going to be folded into a lawsuit down the road as guaranteed by the Ohio Roundtable, because the money has not gone toward education as directed by the Lottery Amendment from 1973, so racing and the state may not see any of this money for quite some time. I have been pretty involved with this over this summer, and it has been quite fun, although my perceptions of politics has changed pretty drastically in the past month and a half. |
#4
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![]() Of course now the tracks and the horsemen must WORK TOGETHER to get a deal in place for purse enhancements.
Bloodhorse Link Who knows how this is going to play out... |
#5
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