Florida Senate vote paves way for more gaming
Greyhound track, casino would benefit
By Bob Rathoeber
brathgeber@news-press.com
© 2009 Ft. Myers News-Press
Thursday, march 26, 2009
A Florida Senate panel passed two gambling bills Wednesday that could have sweeping impact in Southwest Florida: The Naples-Fort Myers Greyhound Track would get video slot machines and the Seminole Casino in Immokalee would add roulette and craps to its other Las Vegas-style games.
Izzy Havenick, vice president of Southwest Florida Enterprises — one of the owners of the Naples-Fort Myers Greyhound Track — called the vote one of the “best days in 25 years” for his family.
“It allows us hopefully to be able to compete in the changing gaming climate in the state of Florida,” he said.
Gov. Charlie Crist has tentatively endorsed the Senate plan, but it’s far from a done deal. A House version is vastly different, and it includes the elimination of blackjack at Seminole casinos. It has yet to be voted on.
A House committee is likely to take up its bill next week, but it’s too early to determine when either would go to the full House and Senate.
At the focal point of the gambling discussion is the state budget, which is in desperate need of a cash infusion. The Senate’s plan would do that. It estimates $1 billion a year, a proposition that even the most skeptical gambling opponent would likely have to consider. The money would be earmarked for education.
If that version becomes law, the Bonita Springs dog track, as well as 17 additional parimutuel sites in the state, could install Class II Video Lottery Terminals, a type of slot machine. Those are the kind that the Immokalee casino had for years before switching to Vegas-style slots last year.
Havenick said it is too early to determine what changes the Bonita Springs race track might make.
“We have not gotten that far,” he said. “Whatever we do, the residents of Bonita Springs and Southwest Florida will be proud of it.”
The big changes for the Seminoles in Immokalee, as well as at their six other casinos around the state, would be roulette wheels, craps tables and unlimited betting stakes in blackjack and poker.
“The tribe is encouraged that both the Senate and the House are talking seriously about a compact during this session,” said Gary Bitner of Hollywood, a spokesman for the Seminole Tribe of Florida. “We’ve been trying to accomplish this for 19 years. This is the farthest we’ve ever gotten.”
The Senate bill’s sponsor, Dennis Jones, R-Seminole, said Florida is already a destination for gambling, and this would only enhance it.
“We’re already a gaming state. With the lottery, with cruises to nowhere, with parimutuels that have been here for 75 years, don’t kid yourself. We’re a gaming state.”
The Senate based its $1 billion estimate on an increase in gambling from the 3.5 million people who leave the state now to gamble, and 2.5 million tourists who come to Florida who want to gamble.
It took less than 30 minutes for the measure to pass through the Senate Regulated Industries Committee. Dave Aronberg, D-West Palm Beach, who represents part of Lee County, was the lone dissenter, voting no to give the Seminoles fully loaded casinos.
“I feel uncomfortable with full casinos in Florida and that’s why I voted no,” Aronberg said.
The Legislature has been forced to take up the gambling issue because the Florida Supreme Court vacated a compact that Crist had signed with the Seminoles. That agreement gave the tribe the right to deal blackjack and install Vegas-type slot machines in exchange for $100 million a year.
But the Florida court ruling, backed by the United States Supreme Court, said the Legislature must sign off on any state-Indian gaming agreement, not solely the governor.
Therefore, because of Indian sovereignty issues, the compact is needed for the state to earn taxes from the Seminoles. If an agreement is not reached, the state stands to lose hundreds of millions of dollars in the future.
“Members have a decision to make,” Jones said. “They can either allow the existing parimutuels to have more products or they can go back home and raise property taxes.”
— The News-Press wire services and the Associated Press contributed to this report.
Winter Park lawmaker doesn't think more
gambling would harm Florida tourism
By: Jason Garcia
Sentinel Staff Writer
Copyright © 2009, Orlando Sentinel
Thursday, March 26, 2009
TALLAHASSEE: A top Orlando legislator -- who will play a central role this spring in deciding whether and how much to expand gambling across Florida -- says he doesn't think new gambling would harm the state's existing tourism industry.
State economists recently released a report warning that casino expansions planned by the Seminole Tribe of Florida could siphon at least $100 million a year away from competing in-state resorts. The Seminoles say they will make the improvements if the Legislature ratifies a compact that the tribe negotiated with Gov. Charlie Crist allowing it to operate Las Vegas-style slot machines and card games such as blackjack.
But Rep. Dean Cannon, a Republican from Winter Park who is in line to become Florida House speaker after the 2010 elections, said he doesn't think any gambling agreement with the Seminoles – whether the one Crist negotiated or a broader or narrower agreement – will have much effect on other travel businesses.
"I don't think Indian compact stuff, regardless of configuration, will have [a negative] impact on tourism," Cannon said.
Cannon said the same about other potential gambling initiatives the Legislature is debating this spring, including whether to allow everything from video-lottery terminals at pari-mutuels across the state and roulette at the Seminole casinos. "I also doubt any pari-mutuel stuff we may consider would be [a] substantial impact to tourism," he said.
Gambling bill zips forward
Tampa Bay Pari-Mutuels Will Benefit
By Mary Ellen Klas
Times/Herald Tallahassee Bureau
© 2009 St. Petersburg Times
Thursday, March 26, 2009
TALLAHASSEE — In less than an hour, the Senate Regulated Industries Committee on Wednesday authorized an expansion of gambling in Florida, that would give the Seminoles full-scale casinos with roulette wheels and craps tables while offering lighter-fare games to horse and dog tracks around the state.
"Don't kid yourself. We are a gaming state, so why wouldn't we want to be the cream of the crop rather than losing citizens going somewhere else?" said Sen. Dennis Jones, the sponsor of the two bills and chairman of the committee.
The state would reap $1 billion a year in new revenue.
Committee members did not debate before unanimously approving the proposal to give the state's 25 parimutuel facilities new gaming options. On the plan to give the Seminole Tribe full-fledged casinos, only West Palm Beach Democrat Dave Aronberg voted no.
The two proposals, which are designed to move through the process in tandem, were so loaded with changes long-sought by the state's gambling industry that one lobbyist called it a Christmas tree bill.
Included is a plan to lower the legal gambling age from 21 to 18, give parimutuels outside of Miami-Dade and Broward counties the option to run electronic slot machines that pit players against each other and allow parimutuels to offer historic racing games in which people bet on the outcomes of past, unidentified horse races.
Two Tampa Bay are parimutuels — Derby Lane in St. Petersburg and Tampa Bay Downs in Oldsmar — could offer the electronic bingo and "instant racing" games if the bills become law.
The new games would help Derby Lanes compete against the Tampa Seminole Hard Rock Casino, said spokeswoman Vera Filipelli. "Being able to introduce those would be a big step," she said.
The Senate bill also reduces the tax rate on slot machine gaming from 50 percent to 35 percent and provides that the payout is no less than 85 percent at all facilities.
The state will get "$1 billion in recurring new general revenue, not just this year but every year," Jones said.
The Senate bill has already won the support of Crist, who said Tuesday that he was "open to any idea that will help us get the compact. … We need the money."
Times staff writer Steve Huettel contributed to this report. Mary Ellen Klas can be reached at meklas@MiamiHerald.com.
Gambling Bill Clears Senate Panel
(From Tampa Tribune)
By Catherine Dolinski
cdolinski@tampatrib.com
Copyright © 2009 Tampa Tribune
Thursday, March 26, 2009
Teens could gamble, Tampa Bay Downs could install electronic bingo and the Seminole Hard Rock Hotel & Casino could offer roulette and craps under a pair of Senate bills that breezed through committee Wednesday.
The committee passage marked the start of what promises to be a tough negotiation between the House and Senate over the future of gambling in Florida. Eyeing a possible $1 billion windfall for the state, the Senate is embracing what one House leader derided as an "unbridled expansion of gaming."
The Senate Regulated Industries Committee took just 20 minutes to approve legislation that would expand gambling at the Seminole Tribe's seven Florida gaming sites, including the Hard Rock in Tampa. The tribe would be able to add roulette and craps to its slot machines and blackjack tables in exchange for paying the state at least $400 million a year.
Nontribal gaming facilities also would get less government and more gaming. The Senate would cut the state tax on slot machine revenue from 50 percent to 35 percent. South Florida racetracks would get blackjack; other parimutuels, including Tampa Bay Downs, could install electronic games such as bingo and poker.
Peter Berube, vice president and general manager of Tampa Bay Downs, said he welcomes any options that make his facility more competitive. "We've seen a definite decline in revenue since the Hard Rock expanded."
All told, the package could net Florida $1 billion, said Sen. Dennis Jones, chairman of the Regulated Industries Committee and sponsor of the legislation. The Senate is factoring about $500 million from gambling into its state spending proposal for 2009-10.
"You're either going to raise money for education in Tallahassee or you're going home to raise property taxes," said Jones, R-Seminole.
Gov. Charlie Crist said he probably could support the Senate plan, despite having campaigned against expanded gambling, but House leaders balked.
Bill Galvano, chairman of the House's panel on Seminole gaming, noted that Crist spoke publicly against a statewide gambling expansion less than a month ago. "I'm surprised that he would even be considering the possibilities that are in the Senate proposal," Galvano said.
The governor has been pressing lawmakers to approve a compact since last summer, when the Florida Supreme Court threw out the terms he had negotiated in 2007. Crist's compact gave the tribe Class III slots and exclusive blackjack rights in exchange for at least $100 million a year.
On March 3, Crist urged lawmakers in his State of the State address to approve those terms, which he said would "safeguard us against the expansion of gambling to every corner of our state."
Wednesday, the governor said he was responding to "the most profound economic change since the Great Depression." That means, he said, "we have to adapt and we have to adjust and we have to be open-minded in order to get through this."
Galvano argued that the Senate plan would bring the state substantially less than $1 billion because increasing gambling could hurt other taxable industries such as tourism and conventions. He is bringing forth a plan that, like Crist's compact, would trade exclusive gaming rights for $100 million a year. But the House bill would force the tribe to give up blackjack, giving the Seminoles geographically exclusive rights pertaining to slots only.
The House also will propose relief for the state's nontribal gaming industries. But it's unlikely to reach as far as the Senate, which, among other things, has proposed lowering the minimum age for playing some casino games from 21 to 18.