Miami Herald: Wed, Feb. 27, 2002

Video gaming goes to a full House
Companion bill stalls in Senate
BY ERIKA BOLSTAD
Email: ERIKA BOLSTAD

TALLAHASSEE - A proposal to expand the state's gambling laws to allow slot machine-style video lottery machines in Florida's 31 racetracks, dog tracks and jai-alai frontons passed a final House committee Tuesday and will now be heard on the House floor.

A companion Senate bill stalled in a committee late Tuesday and won't be heard again until next week.

The proposals, described as a way to generate millions of dollars for education, would allow racetracks and frontons to offer video lottery terminals. Proceeds beyond the money paid out to winners would be spent on education.

Proponents tout the potential gaming profits as a ''cure-all'' for the state's recent budget woes, especially education funding.

''This will put $641 million -- $641 million -- into education,'' said the chief House sponsor of the concept, Rep. Ron Greenstein, D-Coconut Creek. ``This amendment will get us there.''

Greenstein, with the support of many other South Florida legislators, introduced the amendment Tuesday to a relatively innocuous bill sponsored by Rep. Ken Gottlieb, D-Miramar. Gottlieb's bill would require greyhound tracks to offer information about adopting retiring racing dogs.

Although the House proposal was resoundingly supported by South Florida legislators, two video lottery bills offered by Sen. Steve Geller, D-Hallandale Beach, and Sen. Ron Silver, D-North Miami, were postponed for the second week in a row, after a contentious discussion of the status of the Hialeah racetrack reached an impasse.

Both the House and Senate gambling proposals would allow video lottery machines that are similar to slot machines at casinos in Las Vegas or Biloxi, Miss. -- or even at Florida's Indian casinos and the gambling boats departing from Florida ports.

Neither the boats nor the Indian casinos are regulated by the state; as a result, the state gets no revenue from either.

Supporters said they're intrigued by the amount of money video lottery terminals could bring in for education. ''In these days, that's kind of hard to look away from,'' said Rep. Ken Sorensen, Key Largo.

But voters have turned down statewide gambling proposals three times over the past 24 years, a fact pointed out by legislators who opposed the idea.

''The people of Florida have voted down casino-style gambling, over and over again,'' said Rep. Bruce Kyle, R-Fort Myers.

Gambling proponents argue that video lottery terminals would only be offered in the state's parimutuels, eight of which are in Broward and Miami-Dade. They include such places as the Pompano Harness Track, Calder Race Course and Dania Jai Alai.

Dozens of lobbyists for the state's gambling interests packed Senate and House committee meetings Tuesday. Many pointed out that the slot machines would help pump life into the state's struggling parimutuels, even as the state reaps the proceeds for education.

'Every day, there are people just swarming to the Indian reservations and the casinos, to do the `G' word,'' said Jim Tillman, a lobbyist for jai-alai frontons. ``This is not an expansion of gambling. It's already here. This is a measure to upgrade our product and provide some much-needed revenue to our state.''

However successful the proposal is in the House or the Senate, it's unlikely to be supported by Gov. Jeb Bush or Florida Attorney General Bob Butterworth.

Butterworth has spent his career crusading against the expansion of the state's gaming laws. Those battles started in 1979 when Butterworth was sheriff of Broward County and tried to keep the Seminole Tribe of Florida from opening a bingo parlor in Hollywood.

Over the past two decades, Butterworth has fought cruise-to-nowhere boats and the expansion of Indian gaming.

The state has several pending lawsuits against the Seminole Tribe of Florida, which has sought for many years to expand its bingo parlors to casinos with Las Vegas-style gaming.