Gaming Expansion Heads to Floor

The Pennsylvania House will take up gaming legislation today in what is expected to be a contentious debate. Over the weekend the Gaming Oversight Committee passed a bill legalizing table games by a party-line 14-11 vote. The measure sets a 34% tax rate on table game revenue, (that’s 13% more than the highest rate previously discussed by lawmakers) and charges Category 1 and 2 casinos a 20-million dollar license fee. It also raises the slot machine cap at Category 3 resort casinos to 15-hundred machines. Republicans on the committee say the measure was rushed through the committee. Minority Chair Curt Schroder of Chester County made a motion to delay the hearing, but lost along another party-line vote. He says, “We were presented late yesterday afternoon with a 97-page amendment that no one has adequately had the time to review, study, consider all the ramifications and the fine details and exactly what the amendment does.” The table games component was added as an amendment to a senate gaming reform bill. Also added to the bill yesterday was an amendment moved by Jake Wheatley of the hill district that would require the State Gaming Control Board to commission a study on the impact of expanded gaming. It must included data race, gender, geography and income. It would also evaluate the size of the Compulsive and Problem Gambling Treatment Fund. Several Republican members were upset that the bill did not include a measure giving the Attorney General’s office oversight of the gaming Bureau of Investigation and Enforcement.