It was never about children.
All that stuff about improving education was no more than so much creative marketing.
Voting ''Yes for Better Schools'' originated with the same ethic that suggests drinking beer transforms a
20-something slacker into a sexual magnet for lovely women or that $200 sneakers enable chubby white
preadolescents to dunk like Mike.
Slots were never about education.
Anyone with lingering faith in the slots-for-tots campaign received a dose of shock therapy this week. It was
during a meeting of the Senate Regulated Industries Committee in Tallahassee. Beverly Gallagher of the
Broward School Board was asking the committee to push for a 50 percent tax on money collected from the
slot machines coming to Broward's parimutuels.
BULLY BOY
''I was able to get about three sentences out,'' she said.
Suddenly Steve Geller ripped into Gallagher as if this notion of extracting a higher return on behalf of
education was an affront to him personally. Perhaps it was. Sen. Geller, a Democrat from Hallandale Beach,
has become the parimutuels' very own scullery maid in Tallahassee. On Wednesday, he became the gambling
industry's bully boy.
''It's clear to me you have no idea what you're speaking about when you're doing this,'' Geller said. ``I don't
know why the School Board is interjecting itself into something they clearly know so little about.''
Clearly the legalization of slots had nothing to do with education. Clearly, if Yes for Better Schools had even a
vague relationship to schools, a recommendation of the Broward County School Board would not be
denigrated as ``stupidity.''
Clearly, school boards know about schools. Clearly, the real issue here was how much grease Geller and the
parimutuel lobbyists will need to apply to keep the state's share of slot proceeds the lowest of any racino slot
tax in the nation.
TAX RATE
Geller wants 30 percent, a pathetic return compared to the tax rate collected by other racino states. When
Gallagher suggested 50 percent go to education, it was as if the difference was coming out of Geller's own
pocket.
He tore into the School Board and intimated Broward lawmakers might wreak retribution if they didn't cease
meddling in the slots tax debate. Rep. Ron Greenstein of Coconut Creek, another of the parimutuels' stable
boys, got just as nasty, suggesting that he could hardly support a half-penny tax for Broward schools given
that the Broward School Board had been so unenthused about his slot machines.
The bully boys' performance in Tallahassee destroyed the marketing facade. This was definitely not about
education. ''We thought that if this was about education, we need to have a say in it,'' said School Board
member Bob Parks. But the slots issue has to do with resuscitating Broward's fading parimutuels. Now that
the referendum has passed, educators like Gallagher and Parks, he said, ``are on the outside looking in.''
IRONY OF IT ALL
The irony here, of course, is that an overwhelming approval by Broward voters last November gave the
racino amendment its tiny passing margin. On March 8, Miami-Dade voters rejected slots, but Broward said
yes, buying into the parimutuels' campaign that promised gambling proceeds would bring millions to local
schools.
But Broward may very well be getting back less per student than other school districts, if the Legislature
distributes the money according to the state's district cost differential formula that penalizes South Florida for
its sun, sand and leisure benefits.
Gallagher was still stunned a day later by Geller's attack. ``I was just doing what I've been doing for 15
years, asking for more money for schools and teachers. Why that would be a surprise to anybody, I don't
know.''
But we know her offense: She linked slots to schools and teachers. As if that Yes for Better Schools
marketing campaign could have some relationship to the reality.
Clearly, this was never about education.