Pa Gambling Expansion Bill
HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — Top Republicans in Pennsylvania’s state Senate are pressing sweeping gambling legislation that would allow slot machine-like terminals in thousands of bars, restaurants, nonprofit social clubs and other businesses that hold liquor licenses.
What the PA gaming expansion bill does. The bill would legalize online slot machines, online table games and online poker throughout Pennsylvania. It also regulates daily fantasy sports, sports betting (if federally legalized), online lottery, video gaming terminals at truck stops, and tablet gaming in airports. A newly unveiled measure to expand casino-style gambling in Pennsylvania — already the nation’s No. 2 commercial casino state — is on the move in the Legislature in a bid to help the state. A 675-page Pennsylvania gambling expansion bill took just hours to make its way through the House of Representatives, causing some legislators to bristle at its speedy passage. Highlights of Pennsylvania’s casino gambling expansion bill By The Associated Press October 26, 2017 GMT A newly unveiled measure to expand casino-style gambling in Pennsylvania — already the nation’s No. 2 commercial casino state — is on the move in the Legislature in a bid to help the state government plug its biggest cash shortfall.
The legislation could deliver new gambling tax dollars to a state treasury hurting from stay-at-home and shutdown orders issued by Gov. Tom Wolf to fight the spread of the coronavirus.
It also seeks to banish thousands of unregulated cash-paying “skill” game terminals from a wide array of establishments in Pennsylvania, including laundromats, pizza parlors, grocery stores, corner stores and bowling alleys, that do not have liquor licenses.
No Senate vote had been scheduled as of Tuesday as Senate Republican leaders worked to build enough support for it to pass. The bill is opposed by two erstwhile adversaries: casino owners in the nation’s No. 2 commercial casino state and Georgia-based Pace-O-Matic, maker of the software in most common skill terminals, marketed as Pennsylvania Skill games.
Wolf, a Democrat, is taking a dim view of it, warning in a statement from his office that state programs already fed by a “multitude” of legal gambling options, from slot machines in casinos to online lottery games, could lose dollars. He opposes the bill in its current form, his office said Tuesday.
Under a draft amendment, more than 10,000 bars, restaurants, hotels, golf course clubhouses and nonprofit social clubs with liquor licenses could install the so-called video gaming terminals, or VGTs. Counties that host casinos and municipalities could still vote to keep the machines out.
Senate Majority Leader Jake Corman, R-Centre, framed the bill not necessarily as an expansion of gambling, but as a way to get forms of unregulated gambling under control.
“The overall goal is to bring into the light the tens of thousands of unregulated games of skill and VGT devices that are out there in Pennsylvania today,” Corman said Tuesday.
Senate Republican budget analysts projected that taxing the VGTs could yield $200 million to $250 million a year, Corman said.
A major trade association for bars and restaurants, the Pennsylvania Licensed Beverage and Tavern Association, is asking its members to contact senators to support it.
The bill comes as distributors of VGTs — including executives from Golden Entertainment Inc. of Las Vegas — and Pennsylvania Skill games are giving tens of thousands of dollars in campaign contributions to lawmakers and political organizations.
A political action committee backed by a Williamsport-based coin-op machine distributor, Miele Manufacturing, which assembles Pennsylvania Skill games, has given more than $100,000 to lawmakers and political committees going back to last year.
Wolf, at least, might be sympathetic to banishing the skill games: His administration has accused the proliferating skill machines of siphoning more than $200 million in revenue last year from the Pennsylvania Lottery.
While the bill might leave legal room for Pace-O-Matic games in licensed-liquor establishments, the company sees it as a death knell.
“We can’t compete with them,” spokesman Michael Barley said. “Their games are flashier, more appealing. They look like things you would find in a brick-and-mortar casino. ... Our games are slower, more methodical.”
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Pa Gambling Expansion Bill 2019
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