Gamblor’s World

can be accessed at Gambling Watch Global. (http://gamblingwatchglobal.com)

Times Colonist, Tuesday, October 30, 2007

http://www.canada.com/victoriatimescolonist/news/comment/story.html?id=b40ee291-a70d-4a41-a989-44bb9ac31cc9

“The report that pathological gamblers are almost four times more likely than the average Canadian to try to kill themselves is
just the latest piece of evidence that the province has no business in the gaming industry.

It should also press Canadians into demanding government end its aggressive promotion of lotteries and casinos outright. No
amount of “easy” revenue is worth Canadians’ lives.

Anti-gambling and safety advocates have long warned that problem gambling can lead to suicide. The study just published by the
Canadian Journal of Psychiatry is based on a nationwide survey of 36,000 Canadians, and found a strong connection between
compulsive betting and self-harm.” continued ….

Oct 16 2007, Abbotsford News

Abbotsford’s mayor and council were last night expected to make a decision on a bid to install up to 125 slot machines in the city’s bingo hall.

Five weeks after a public hearing which attracted more than 400 people, the application by the Abbotsford Bingo Association and Playtime Community Gaming Centres Inc. was on yesterday evening’s regular council agenda.

At the September public hearing, more than two-thirds of those who spoke voiced support for the plan.

There has been a greater time lapse than usual between a public hearing and a council vote, due to a decision by Abbotsford Mayor George Ferguson to only discuss the matter when all council members were present.

Last night’s meeting, which occurred after press deadline, was the first opportunity to do that.

The application, if approved, would see the bingo hall on Peardonville Road revamped into a community gaming centre. It would initially include 50 slot machines, a number which could grow to 125 depending on their popularity.

Operators of the Abbotsford bingo hall say the facility will close without the additional cash. Last year, the business handed $2.3 million in revenue to local community groups.

Copyright © 2007 Abbotsford News, A Division of Black Press Group Ltd.

Listowner 0pinion - this is a very misguided decision. How much harm is going to be created in Abbotsford due to 50 or 125 slot machines being installed in a moribund bingo hall? How much is the gambling harm going to end up costing Abbotsford? Is there help for problem gamblers in place in Abbotsford now? Are there provisions to offer help for problem gamblers and their families in Abbotsford once this decision is passed?
Lots of questions. As much research with regards to the introduction of gambling, especially slots, into a community - the economic benefits often pale compared to the costs in terms of community well-being. While the introduction of gambling into a community is often promoted as an economic boom, this is seldom the case in actuality, according to existing research in this field. It is a politician’s answer to generating revenues without consideration of the possible and potential harm that is created in communities with slots and a very short-term economic solution - superficial - rather than providing long-term economic development that benefits the community without creating harm.

The creation of community gambling centres out of dying bingo halls is occuring throughout BC - I would be very wary of this development. Research indicates that the community costs of slots end up to be way more than the revenues generated in terms of fraud, family dissolution and break-up, harm to children, etc. etc.

By MICHAEL WALSH,
Capital Gazette
Published October 14, 2007

WASHINGTON - Slot machines, like the ones Gov. Martin O’Malley wants to
bring to Maryland, are “rigged” and designed to create addiction, said the
National Coalition Against Gambling Expansion on Friday. “The aim of these
technologies is to get people to play longer, faster and
more intensely,” said Massachusetts Institute of Technology professor
Natasha Schull.

Schull spoke at a news conference at the National Press Club in Washington,
introducing her research showing electronic gambling machines to be
habit-forming as part of a wider effort by the coalition to arrest the tide
toward gambling expansion.

continued at http://www.hometownannapolis.com/cgi-bin/read/2007/10_14-55/TOP

Will Also Highlight Gambling Industry’s Drive to Transform States Into
‘Casino Republics’

WASHINGTON, Oct. 10 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ — The following was
released today by the National Coalition Against Gambling Expansion:

WHAT: At a time when casino gambling is one of the hottest issues in
many state capitols across the nation, the National Coalition
Against Gambling Expansion will call on federal leaders to apply
existing trade and consumer laws to slot machines, something they
say is not happening at the state level because state officials
have become too dependent upon gambling profits to pay for public
services. NCAGE will also highlight how the casino industry is
subverting the democratic process in these states to push slots
into communities with little transparency and public input.

NCAGE is a national coalition representing over 26 million in all
50 states concerned about the public health, economic and social
impacts of promoting casino gambling in nearby locales.

WHO: MIT Professor Dr. Natasha Schull, author of Machine Life:
Control and Compulsion in Las Vegas, to be published by Princeton
University Press in 2008

Roger Horbay, President of Game Planit Interactive Corp, a
recognized expert in the field of Electronic Gaming and
Electronic Gaming Machines and how the technology contributes to
the development and maintenance of pathological gambling
http://www.gameplanit.com/

Tim Potts, cofounder of Democracy Rising Pennsylvania, a group
formed in August 2004 as a direct response to the
unconstitutional enactment of the law that made Pennsylvania the
slot machine capital of the East Coast
http://www.democracyrisingpa.com/

Daniel Hunter, Executive Director of Casino-Free Philadelphia,
an organization opposing casino development in Philadelphia
neighborhoods
http://www.casinofreephila.org/

WHEN: Friday, October 12th at 10 a.m.

WHERE: The National Press Club, Zenger Room, 529 14th Street NW,
Washington, DC

SOURCE National Coalition Against Gambling Expansion

——————————————————————————–

Link to this page:

back to top

Related links:

http://www.casinofreephila.org/

http://www.democracyrisingpa.com/

http://www.gameplanit.com/

at http://www.saipantribune.com/newsstory.aspx?newsID=72969&cat=3

The NYTimes.com web page also provides a display through which information can be obtained for a specific state.

——————————————————————————–

October 7, 2007
For Schools, Lottery Payoffs Fall Short of Promises
By RON STODGHILL and RON NIXON
<Last year, North Carolina’s governor, Mike Easley, finally delivered on his promise to start a lottery, making his state the most recent of the 42 states and the District of Columbia to cash in on legalized gambling.

If some voters in this Bible Belt state frowned on Mr. Easley’s push to bring gambling here, others were persuaded by his argument that North Carolina’s students were missing out on as much as $500 million in aid annually as residents crossed the border to buy lottery tickets elsewhere.

“Our people are playing the lottery,” the governor said in an address two years ago that was a prelude to the creation of the North Carolina Education Lottery. “We just need to decide which schools we should fund, other states’ or ours.”

Pitches like this have become popular among lawmakers who, since states began legalizing lotteries more than 40 years ago, have sold gambling as a savior for cash-starved public schools and other government programs. Lotteries have raised billions of dollars, and of the 42 states that have them, 23 earmark all or some of the money for education.

For years, those states have heard complaints that not enough of their lottery revenue is used for education. Now, a New York Times examination of lottery documents, as well as interviews with lottery administrators and analysts, finds that lotteries accounted for less than 1 percent to 5 percent of the total revenue for K-12 education last year in the states that use this money for schools.

In reality, most of the money raised by lotteries is used simply to sustain the games themselves, including marketing, prizes and vendor commissions. And as lotteries compete for a small number of core players and try to persuade occasional customers to play more, nearly every state has increased, or is considering increasing, the size of its prizes — further shrinking the percentage of each dollar going to education and other programs.

In some states, lottery dollars have merely replaced money for education. Also, states eager for more players are introducing games that emphasize instant gratification and more potentially addictive forms of gambling.

Of course, the question of how much lotteries contribute to education has been around for years. But the debate is particularly timely now that at least 10 states and the District of Columbia are considering privatizing their lotteries, despite assurances decades ago that state involvement would blunt social problems that might emerge from an unregulated expansion of lotteries. These trends fly in the face of marketing campaigns that often emphasize lotteries’ educational benefits, like a South Carolina lottery slogan, “Big Fun, Bright Futures,” or an ad campaign in North Carolina featuring a thank-you note passed through schools and signed “The Students.” The New York Lottery’s Web site includes the tagline, “Raising billions to educate millions.”

Promotions like these have taken root. Surveys and interviews indicate that many Americans in states with lotteries linked to education think their schools are largely supported by lottery funds — so much so that they even mention this when asked to vote for tax increases or bond authorizations to finance their schools.

A Growing Industry

Long a mainstay of American life, lotteries began as raffles in the 1700s to finance the Continental Army, bridges and roads, and Columbia University. But modern lotteries are big businesses, run by streamlined enterprises with managers and consultants from Fortune 500 companies.

State lotteries raised more than $56 billion and returned $17 billion to the state governments last year. They spent more than $460 million last year on advertising, making them one of the nation’s largest marketers. The 197,000 retailers that sell lottery products earned $3.3 billion in commissions in 2006.

Lottery advocates say the games live up to their public mandate. According to the North American Association of State and Provincial Lotteries, $234 billion has gone into state coffers since the first modern lottery was started in New Hampshire in 1964.

“Lotteries bring additional money to states that can be used very effectively to fund special projects without raising taxes,” said Charles Strutt, executive director of the Multi-State Lottery Association, a nonprofit group.

But among the states that earmark lottery money for education, lottery dollars accounted for 1 percent or less of the total K-12 education financing (including all state, federal and local revenue) last year in at least five states, including New Jersey. New York had the highest percentage, 5.3 percent.

(Five states — Georgia, Kentucky, New Mexico, South Carolina and Tennessee — direct lottery dollars primarily to college scholarships. North Carolina and Florida also give some money to scholarships. )

At least five states — California, Missouri, New Jersey, Ohio and Washington — channel lottery money to higher education as well as elementary and secondary schools. In these states, too, lottery proceeds amount to less than 5 percent of the total education financing.

In at least four states — California, Illinois, Michigan and Texas — lottery dollars as a percentage of K-12 education money has declined or remained flat over the last decade.

In California, for example, the lottery in 1985 accounted for almost 5 percent of all K-12 education dollars. Today, it makes up less than 2 percent, or about $1 billion, of the $54 billion the state spends on in K-12 education, according to the California Budget Project, a nonprofit research group in Sacramento.

The California Department of Education addressed this in its State Fact Book two years ago: “Although the public still perceives the lottery as making a significant difference in the funds available for education,” the book read, “it is a minor source that cannot be expected to provide major improvements in K-12 education.”

Some state lotteries have fallen short of projections. In North Carolina, where officials expected the lottery to generate $400 million to $500 million a year for education, revenue reached just over $300 million in its first full year of operations. In Oklahoma, officials expected schools to receive $52 million last year from the lottery, but the final tally was $15 million less.

Also, the portion of lottery money going to state programs is shrinking. When Missouri passed its lottery in 1985, it required that at least 45 percent of all proceeds go to the state, and the number went as high as 52 percent. Legislators revised the law, and now the state gets about 30 percent of proceeds.

The Times review of documents from all 42 states with lotteries and the District of Columbia found that nearly all have increased payouts and lowered the percentage going to programs. And those that have not changed their payout formulas are considering it.

Lawmakers and lottery officials defend the practices, saying schools and other programs will still benefit from the extra money raised by lotteries.

“Too much of the focus is on percentages,” said Gardner Gurney, acting director of the New York lottery. “My focus is on dollars. You can’t spend percentages.”

In 2000, New York State kept 38 percent of its lottery revenue for education. That share has dropped to 32 percent, but the dollar amount rose from $1.3 billion in 2000 to $2.2 billion last year.

But Jerry McPeak, a Democratic state representative in Oklahoma, said states that have committed to a percentage should not later lower that number.

“I think if you pass a lottery and tell people that a certain proportion of those dollars are going to something like education, then you ought to keep your word,” Mr. McPeak said.

School Budgets in Flux

In some states, lottery dollars are pooled with other funds, making it impossible to determine how much the lottery benefits schools. That is the case in Michigan, Texas and Illinois.

Because legislators in these states decide school budgets well in advance of knowing what lottery revenue will be, lottery money is just another part of the overall budget. If the lottery dollars are below projections, the state makes up the shortfall with money from other sources, or in some cases, simply gives schools less money. If the lottery dollars exceed projections, the state uses some of the money for other programs.

“Legislators merely substitute general revenue funds with lottery dollars so the schools don’t really gain any additional funding,” said O. Homer Erekson, dean of the business school at the University of Missouri in Kansas City, who co-wrote a national study on lottery money and school financing.

States including Georgia, Oklahoma and South Carolina have enacted laws that prohibit substituting lottery dollars for money that would have otherwise gone to education. But such laws have not stopped legislators.

Oklahoma, for example, used lottery money last year for a portion of promised teacher raises that were supposed to come from the general fund. The move provoked an angry response from education officials and some legislators.

In Nebraska, from 2002 through the last fiscal year, legislators diverted lottery dollars from the state’s K-12 education and other programs into the general fund to make up for a shortfall.

“Diverting lottery funds into the general fund was one of many ways to make up for the lost revenues,” said Bruce Snyder, a supervisor in the accounting office at the Nebraska Department of Administrative Services.

Lottery officials say they are unfairly blamed for legislators’ decisions. “Our job is to raise money for the things the legislators want,” said Clint Harris, director of the Minnesota lottery. “We don’t have any control over what happens to the money.”

But Brett McFadden, a budget analyst with the Association of California School Administrators, said: “It makes it harder for us to convince people that they still need to support education.” He added, “They think the lottery is taking care of education. We have to tell them we’re only getting a few sprinkles; we’re not even getting the icing on the cake.”

New Games and Gimmicks

As player interest has flagged, some lotteries have responded with aggressive marketing and new products that critics say can undermine public trust.

In an effort to attract younger customers, several states have introduced video lottery terminals, in which players wager against a computer, and Keno, a bingo-like video game. Critics have labeled both kinds of games “video crack” because of their addictive nature. Fifteen states offer electronic gambling machines, and several more are considering adding them.

This year in Florida, state officials estimated that the state could raise an additional $1 billion from video terminals and $39 million to $241 million from Keno. The report also noted that both games “are considered to be more addictive than traditional lottery games and could contribute to a problem of pathological gambling.”

While introducing Keno in Florida would require legislative approval because of potential problems associated with gambling, Florida officials view the issue through an economic lens.

“We will determine which, of the products legally available to us, fits in fulfilling that mission,” said Jackie Barreiros, a spokeswoman for the Florida lottery.

Keith Whyte, executive director of the National Council on Problem Gambling, said many states are also introducing higher-price games, underscoring a Vegas-style rivalry among states for gambling dollars.

California’s contract with its instant ticket vendor, Scientific Games, calls for the introduction of 30 to 45 new games a year. Kansas, Texas and Michigan recently introduced a $50 scratch ticket, the most expensive in the nation.

States are also trying to bolster the number of “core” players, according to interviews with lottery officials in several states. Such players typically represent only 10 percent to 15 percent of all players but account for 80 percent of sales, according to Independent Lottery Research, which does research and marketing for state lotteries.

In North Carolina, Mr. Easley faces a battle in proving that the lottery will be a winner for voters. After its first full year, revenue was 25 percent less than projected, giving critics ammunition in their case that lottery revenue is an unreliable source of money for schools.

The governor declined to be interviewed, but Dan Gerlach, his senior policy adviser for fiscal affairs, said lottery officials had overestimated the market size of rival lotteries in Virginia, South Carolina and Georgia when developing the state’s gambling efforts. But Mr. Gerlach said he expected the state to sell millions more tickets in coming months than it did last year.

That is because Mr. Easley recently persuaded his legislature to increase lottery prizes. The move will reduce the percentage of lottery dollars going to education. But North Carolina is choosing a tried and true formula: raising payouts increases customer traffic.

“People like to win big,” Mr. Gerlach said. “Now, the pot is bigger.”>

Thursday, October 4, 2007 | 1:58 PM ET
CBC News
<The head of Ontario’s Problem Gambling Research Centre is calling for tougher rules to protect players who use the 23,000 slot machines in the province.

The Alcohol and Gaming Commission is currently drafting new standards to address questions about machines that flash jackpot symbols or distort the true odds of winning.

But Rob Simpson of the gambling research centre says the new standards proposed for Ontario’s slot machines allow for cheating and deception and is calling on the commission to toughen the rules to better protect players and potential addicts.

Earlier this year CBC News videotaped slots in action across Ontario and then slowed down the images.

The investigation found that some machines rapidly flashed jackpot symbols at players, symbols barely detectable to the naked eye.>

continued at http://www.cbc.ca/canada/toronto/story/2007/10/04/ont-slots.html?ref=rss

at http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20071004/lf_afp/lifestylemyanmarchinagambling_071004131914&printer=1;_ylt=AiPgpn6GiK2c1sGeW1mwf5v2_sEF

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