Action at the House Gaming Oversight Committee

 

The House Gaming Oversight Committee was in action this week.  It held hearings on two bills:  HB 1663, which would grant video poker machines to a great number of small establishments across the state, and HB 783, which would require casino operators to send monthly activity statements to gamblers and their families.

 

The rise of HB 1663 is predictable, part of the continuing “race to the bottom” that is central to gambling expansion in America.  Whenever one group of people gets the right to operate a gambling facility, everyone else wants the same right.  And government, increasingly addicted to gambling revenues, is happy to take a cut from any and all forms of gambling.  That’s how West Virginia ended up with keno machines all over the state.  (You may remember the story a few years ago on two girls from Weirton who started a protest when the town’s last ice cream parlor became a keno site instead.  As of that time, Weirton had 80 gambling sites for 20,000 people, or 1 for every 250 residents.)

 

Dianne Berlin ably testified on behalf of CasinoFreePA at the HB 1663 hearing on July 29, arousing some pro-gambling legislators’ ire by referring to the proposal as a “mini-casinos” bill.

                                                

The next day, the committe gave its kind attention to HB 783, the proposal developed by reformed gambler Bill Kearney. I am pasting below Bill’s e-mail that tells you how to listen to his testimony.  The e-mail also contains links to sections of a movie Bill hopes to market.

 

[note from Bill Kearney follows]

If you want to see how Pa. State Representatives who brought the casino plague upon us and our clueless Gaming Control Board members feel about preventing our loved ones from becoming casino gambling degenerates then watch the Pennsylvania Cable Network (PCN) today at 9AM. They will be airing the Pennsylvania Gaming Oversight Committees public hearing that was held Wednesday on House Bill 783. This Bill will make the casino operators who are already tracking their patrons' money and time spent gambling with COMP-CARDS to send monthly statements. You can also watch on line by opening this link - http://www.pcntv.com/index.html# - and at the top of the page go to STREAMING. Or open this link and watch captions of the hearing. http://roxburynews.com/

Open these links and check out Gov. Rendell’s and other legislators’ opinion on casinos sending monthly statements in my casino gambling documentary.

Part 1 - http://www.veoh.com/videos/v14777991HqeDbkfE

Part 2 - http://www.veoh.com/videos/v1478320872rs2KCc

Part 3 - http://www.veoh.com/videos/v14787210ZeQcTpsY

Part 4 - http://www.veoh.com/videos/v14791467XWJ3wayk

To learn more about my credentials on this subject go on line and look up Bill Kearney on casino gambling.

[end of Bill Kearney’s note]

 

Please take action:  Contact your legislators and tell them (a) to oppose HB 1663 or any other gambling expansion bills; (b) to support HB 783 as a means of reducing the social and economic suffering unleashed by gambling expansion.

 

The Bluhm mess

 

Neil Bluhm is still working to persuade the Gaming Control Board that his group should be permitted to take over the Pittsburgh casino license.  Since the Gaming Control Board’s main interest is usually to maximize profits, he will probably get his way sooner or later.  But kudos to State Senators Orie and Ferlo for opposing the hasty transfer and calling for a rebid.

 

Dan Onorato and Luke Ravenstahl are alarmed that the Pittsburgh casino might not be generating profits off local victims for up to four more years in case of a rebid.  Too bad they can’t recognize the benefits that will result from not subjecting local residents to the immediate availability of a casino and the likely upsurge in gambling addiction.  Remember, even a 1 percent increase in gambling addiction among adults in Allegheny County would equate to 9,000 new problem gamblers.  And that’s a lot of suffering.

 

Other recent news

 

From Dianne Berlin’s e-mails of the past couple weeks:

 

*           A typical story about increasing gambling addiction, this one featuring the impact on seniors in south Florida:  http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/southflorida/sfl-fladdict30sbjul30,0,4121123.story

*           A big rise in calls to West Virginia’s gambling help line, mostly due to slots:  http://www.herald-dispatch.com/news/x1103457560/No-Headline

*           An excellent, thorough article from the Ottawa Citizen on the dishonesty of slot machines with unbalanced reels, and the history of the development and unfortunate legalization of such machines:  http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/news/observer/story.html?id=df9b06d4-005a-4303-b351-794c75171a05

 

If you missed the mid-July newsletter …

 

I got a large number of bounced-back messages after sending out my last newsletter.  If you didn’t receive it and actually like reading this stuff, let me know and I will resend.

 

--Bruce