For the third time in as many years, an Illinois Senate committee has passed an expansion of casino gaming in the state, but this time it has a caveat: online gaming and poker is a part of the bill.
The new legislation, SB1739, is virtually the same bill that has been introduced in the Illinois General Assembly in the two previous years. It calls for an expansion of casino gaming into the cities of Danville, Rockford, Lake County and the suburbs of Chicago. If passed into law, it would more than double the number of physical gaming locations in the Land of Lincoln from its present ten sites to 23 across the state.
The new twist on the bill, however, is the inclusion of online gaming and poker into the equation. The sponsor of the bill in the Senate, Senator Terry Link (D-Waukegan), included the online gaming language into the bill due to the present factors of the online industry. “You could sit there and do what they are doing right now with offshore betting,” Link stated to the Champaign News-Gazette’s Tom Kacich.
The total revenues generated by the new gaming measures, including online gaming, would be a welcome addition to the Illinois budget. Facing severe shortfalls in its budget and pension funding issues, Kacich states that online gaming and poker could generate up to $150 million per year in revenues for the state. The other areas, such as five new casinos, slot machines and “racinos” (horse tracks with casinos) and gaming in Chicago’s two airports could add up from anywhere to $400 million to $1 billion annually.
The caveat, however, is that Senator Link wants to keep the money at home. “This would be limited to Illinois only,” Senator Link stated to Kacich. “I couldn’t bet with Nevada or New Jersey. It’s for Illinois residents in Illinois.” As the fifth most populated state in the U. S. with nearly 13 million residents, it would be an attractive partner for the interstate compacts that have been discussed by both Nevada and New Jersey for internet gaming.
The path for expansion of gaming in Illinois, be it online or otherwise, has been a difficult one, however. Governor Pat Quinn did sign into law the ability for bars and restaurants to offer video slot machines and poker, but he has vetoed two similar bills to Link’s in the past two years. To attempt to sway Governor Quinn’s opinion on this bill, Senator Link has removed some parts that Governor Quinn requested.
Previous bills had proceeds going to various other projects that had nothing to do with gaming, including contributions to 4-H clubs, soil and water conservation and other organizations. “He (Governor Quinn) took it all out in his proposal and we went along,” Senator Link said to Kacich. Other changes that Senator Link made at Governor Quinn’s request were that a ban would be places on campaign contributions by gaming license holders and that the new operations would fall under the state gaming board.
Many members of the Illinois General Assembly and Governor Quinn weren’t ready to comment on their stance for the bill, but opponents are already stepping forward to express their thoughts. Citing that gaming across the state has dropped by 38%, the executive director of the Illinois Casino Gaming Association, Tom Swoik, sees it as possibly diluting the pool rather than increasing it. “We’re not against expansion,” Swoik stated to Kacich. “We want to see responsible expansion. But at this time we have video gaming up and running, video poker…(adding) the internet is another large component.”
Anita Bedell of the Illinois Church Action on Alcohol and Addiction Problems said, “This is a very bad idea. It’s coming too fast,” citing her concerns on children being easily exposed to gambling with the online factor.
Illinois joins a few states that have started to reexamine their positions regarding online gaming. Both California and Iowa have recently introduced legislation for online poker and Texas is considering the issue. Along with the three players that have already passed legislation for either online gaming, poker or both (Nevada, New Jersey and Delaware), the dominoes are beginning to fall.
