Feuding over who controls, profits from sports betting in Kansas stalls legislation

TOPEKA - Kansas City Chiefs fan Rob Olson voted to allow his colleagues to take on the Super Bowl during the Kansas Senate Debt, as he was frustrated by the inability of politicians, lobbyists and gambling establishments to reach a conclusion that would allow him to legally arrange bets on the 2020 Super Bowl.

If there had been no such reform, Olson would have had the opportunity to drive 170 miles from his home in Orata to the hotel and lake casino in Iowa. This would allow him to legally join the 9 million Yankees who put money on the Super Bowl to watch the Chefs and the San Francisco 49ers command Liv.

Olson's favorite team beat this IRGE in the IRGE, but the Republican senator's sense of joy quickly evaporated as the 2020 Legislative Collection failed to develop a compromise bill to provide sports bookmakers in Kansas. Political and financial difficulties, not the coronavirus, tore apart Kansas' creeping hopes of offering adjustable and taxable sports gambling.

All the misfortunes of the state's supporters are just a prelude to the fun among the dark bookmakers.

"I was tired of the people who moved to AIOVA to handle gambling and creating bets on the Super-Cup," Olson said, calling on his political opponents and supporters to stop the burnout and close their positions. "We're going to dig in here until we can't turn this bill over," Olson said. "During this time, we won't have the ability to make more than a year's worth of revenue."

In fact, the legislative movement aimed at putting resources into a space saturated with skilled and student sports betting has failed.

The Kansas Senate has approved a bill that would provide new opportunities for the state to operate sportsbooks at its four casinos owned by the state. The bill would also allow the Kansas Lottery to implement internet tickets.

The Senate strategy was ignored by the opposing chamber of supporters who wanted up to 1, 200 lottery shops to win the state's sports rates. Another version of the chamber did not have time to pass from the committee because Covid-19 cut the legislative session. The risk of infection forced lawmakers to roll out of the issue, leaving no time to resolve the agreement between the lottery and the state's casinos, the Legislative Assembly and Governor Laura Kelly.

Rivalry of the Rich

Unlike the Super Cup, which by rules has no chance of ending in a draw, races between elected officials and special interests often end without a clear favorite.

The gap between the House of Representatives and the Senate is very large, and Vic e-Chair Jeff Long Vine (from Empolia, the Republican Party) unless the March parliament was stagnant due to the pandemic (global epidemic). He concluded that the conclusion of the treaty was virtually impossible. The main difference in opinion was who would be dominant in the legal sports betting industry in Kansas. This was a hom e-like internal conflict between the four private casinos, which were part of the state, and the Kansas lottery, part of Kansas.

"There was a big difference in the two bills," Long Vine says. "In fact, we think we were far apart on the major controversy."

I had no idea how famous Sportsbetting would be in Kansas and what would be the burden on the revenue. The Senate was 5 % on the income from fac e-t o-face gambling, 8 % of the Internet gambling, and the only 2 % of the funds for gambling to the gambling. The lower house hoped to receive 14 % from the state's own tax rate and 20 % from the Internet.

Republican Susan Wagle, a Republican party from Wichita, said that if there were laws that would affect legal sports betting in Kansas, they would exempt 2 % of prize money to treat gambling addiction. (Nick Crugh, Kansasri Frector paper)

The Senate's bill did not allow sports betting at the racetrack. The Senate did not want to pay the professional league to the official statistics fee, but the monastery stuck to their worldview.

It also made sense from a philosophical point of view that the Senate would have to set a barrier between the state government and sports bookmakers faced. The lower house's bill was responsible for the loss to the state taxpayer.

The Senate has been reluctant to play the role of a regulatory organization and operator to the Kansas lottery competing with Dodge City, Pittsburg, Marbane, and Kansas City's stat e-approved casinos in Kansas City.

Dan Hawkins, the majority of the Republican House of Representatives selected in Wichita, believes that considering sports betting in the lower house will bear fruit, except for trivial difficulties.

"If the session has not been shortened, I think everything was bearing. I hope it will be realized this year," said Hawkins.

Casino project

The Senate bill announced in January is the four casino operations: Kansasstarcasino in Marbine, Kansas City in Kansas City, Hollywood Casino in Kansas City, Boot Hill Casino Resort in Dodge City, and Pittsburg's Kansosclossing Casino & Hotel. It was the result of the long secret negotiations that provided the financial interests of the company.

According to this project, each casino has two sportsbooks. People can bet directly or on the Internet through a casino application. Acquired companies have the chance to include customers to bed on mobile phones through casinos. Their idea was to prohibit Kansas lottery from proceeding with a sports betting platform that can be used 24 hours a day, 365 days a year with mobile phones and computer support.

The Kansas lottery may introduce Internet tickets for the first time. The bill has been changed in this way, and if at least two casinos have begun creating a sports betting ticket in July 2022, the lottery in Kansas may provide gambling games online.

The 4-licensed casino, honor casinos, have the right to participate in sports betting, and since then the Gambling business in Kansas, the same as $ 1 billion, is 100 million for the state every year. It is interrupted by $ 10 million, represents the profits of Matthew BERGMANN, Boot Hill Casino, Resort and Kansa Scrossing Casino.

"The sports rate is an effective stock to recruit new buyers, especially if we can provide mobile betting," said Jeff-Morris, Pen-National-Gaming, Control Casino-Hollywood. Head said.

Other states are moving forward in a way to legalize gambling, but Adept houses and Senate Kansas for two sessions stay in control and benefit from reducing bookmakers' dark markets. There is no opportunity to come to a contract over people. (Shaman Smith/ Kansasri Frector)

Fans, for example, the casino models are blessed by some Senator and the Republican supporters, and their best opportunities are to reach the Senate from the sports body at the start of the 2020 session. I concluded. And as the Senate borrowed their own transactions, they were all candidates proposed by President Avirin, President of Avirin, who led the Adept House of Representatives on the Federal issue and state issues. We imposed a blast task to ourselves.

Mr. Barker's strategy was to arrange a lottery of Changsa about sports betting, so that casinos and Kabadrome could compete with these fresh gambling bucks as well as retailers. Apart from this, his bill was set to allow lottery games online.

"You can buy a lottery ticket, you can bet on K-State-KU games, you can buy a loaf of bread, you can buy 45 gallons of gas, you can do anything," Barker said.

Sports betting advocates expected both bills to go to House and Senate conference committees for negotiations related to the governor's approval. The discussions were expected to be complicated by the fact that the governor wants to establish a reliable i-Lottery run by the Kansas Lottery.

Allegations

Senator Holland, a Democrat from Baldwin City, said he supports legal sports gambling in Kansas, but believes casino lobbyists have led the Senate to a proposal that is financially very generous to these physical businesses. In his writing, the state is "putting money on the table."

In addition, in Holland's writing, the bill contains promises by casino operators that should be written into contracts, not state law. In his writing, it is impossible to establish effective public-private partnerships without the ability to respond immediately to changing market conditions.

"This is not a static environment. At the beginning of our journey into sports betting, we're not going to be all aristocrats. You can't weigh everything up in advance."

Jeff Rutland, a rancher in Independence, used the words "ironic" and "weird" to talk about the hypocrisy of the companies Kansas hired to run its four casinos. He spent a decade laying the groundwork for casinos and watched a proposal to amend a 2007 law that allowed slot machines at dog and horse tracks be defeated. All the tracks are closed, and Rutland thinks the 40 percent tax on track winnings should be reduced. Casinos pay a 22 percent tax on the bailout.

"The only people who would be opposed to this change would be the state's casino associations.

Governor Laura Kelly says she wants to pass a sports gambling bill in Kansas that would allow the Kansas Lottery to offer Internet lottery games for the first time. (Sherman Smith/The Kansas Reporter)

The Kansas Municipal League complained that a sports fee bill introduced in Kansas would provide revenue to the state government but not to cities and counties. The Humane Society's Kansas Legislative Fund recommended that greyhound councils be banned if horse racing tracks open in Kansas or if jumping events from other states are broadcast in Kansas. The National Gambling Commission called on lawmakers to direct at least 1% of revenues toward addiction prevention and treatment.

Senate President Susan Wagle (R-Wichita) said the bill should include a provision directing 2% of sports fees to treatment for gambling addicts. She worked to get the measure included in the Senate bill.

"When you increase the availability of gambling, you increase the number of people with drug addiction," Wagle said.

Skyline

Sports gambling is legal in 21 states, including the District of Columbia, Colorado and Illinois, and this number could grow if the pandemic had not denied Kansas the ability to address the dispute during the 2020 session.

COVID-19 has damaged the economy, unemployment, city, county and state tax costs, including lottery revenue, but weakened the projected Kansas Treasury deficit in the amount of more than $1 billion as an incentive for the 2021 Legislative Session to persuade the 2021 Legislative Session group for a compromise.

"We need more revenue," says House Minority Leader Tom Sawyer (D-Vt.). "Unfortunately, this has not been possible. I would like to see this get off the ground."

House Minority Leader Tom Sawyer, R-Wichita, says the state government needs new revenue, so the 2021 Legislature must work on a sports gambling legalization bill. (Nick Circle, Kansas Reflector)

A Kansas district attorney has filed a lawsuit to overturn the U. S. Department of the Interior's decision to remove obstacles to the Wyandot tribe of Oklahoma building a casino on tribal land near Wichita.

Tribal leader Bill Friend said the lawsuit filed by District Attorney General Derek Schmidt is a waste of time. He said Kansas casinos and tribal gambling businesses will soon have a rival.

"They've been fighting us in Washington for 14 years, trying to undermine our legal rights," he said. "We've fought politics and all the money they've spent lobbying."

The moment Kansas missed the ball, the pressure to support reforms grew.

"This is a turning point for sports betting in America," said Bill Miller, president of the American Gambling Association. "By the end of the year, about 100 million Americans will be able to legally bet on sports in their own states."