Author: Casino Connection Staff

For a year and a half, supporters of sports betting in Massachusetts have been impatient with the lag the Bay State has shown as other New England states, such as New Hampshire and Rhode Island, beat it to the punch.

But when it comes to gaming laws, there’s the fast way, the slow way and the Massachusetts way, which is about as thorough a vetting process as you’re likely to get.

Probably the most powerful fan of sports betting to weigh in on the issue is Governor Charlie Baker, who a year ago filed his own version of a sports betting bill. Though nothing’s happened with it yet, Baker was optimistic enough to include $35 million in anticipated state revenue from sports betting in his 2021 budget, filed with the legislature in January.

Several sports betting bills have been under the microscope of the state’s Committee on Economic Development, chaired by Rep. Ann-Margaret Ferrante and Senator Eric Lesser. The two have been studying the issue since last May, in a through and plodding manner. They appear to be near the end of that process.

Last week, the various active sports betting bills were included in an extension order the committee filed last week so it could continue working until February 28.

Rep. Michael Soter—that rarest of all birds in the Massachusetts legislature, a Republican—has been serving on that committee, and had nothing but praise for the joint chairs when he appeared on a sports radio show on WEEL. He declared, “We are putting all the necessary steps in place to effectively roll out the best product.”

GGB News caught up with Soter last week. “My thing is, we’re looking at all the other states that have brought in online gaming, whether phone or brick and mortar,” he said. “Just because the other states rushed it out doesn’t mean that’s the right way to do it. We’re trying to get it right.”

He said Ferrante and Lesser “are doing a great job. There’s a lot to learn, and safeguards you have to think about. Such as if we have NCAA betting, how do we insulate the young players. We’re looking at how Las Vegas is doing it.”

Addiction is also a concern, he said. “We also have a lottery system that, if we allow online for sports betting, do we also need to get that up to 21st century standards? And we have to make sure there are taxpayer safeguards.”

Soter said he believes something will happen this year. “When it does, it will be a great product that the taxpayers will be proud of.”

The representative doesn’t want to limit sports betting to commercial gaming halls. “If I could wave a magic wand, I wouldn’t want to leave it to the casinos. If we limit it to one segment, we could leave out a huge economic boom for those small business owners, the folks who make the economy run.”

He envisions customers sitting at local establishments, watching the games and betting online. “I think there’s a way that online gambling and casinos could coexist,” he said. One thing that many don’t include in their calculations is the added meal and income taxes that “mom-and-pop operations will generate from this,” he said.

“Most online gaming pieces are owned by MGM and Wynn, and the only one that isn’t is DraftKings, and they’re headquartered here. There’s a component that we could have throughout that could make everything work.”

Rhode Island’s mistake, said Soter, was trying to run sports betting itself, without partnering with such a provider. “I want the taxpayers protected, so we don’t put our own tax money into a system that should be self-sustaining.” He believes that Rhode Island rushed things, “and it could have been better.”

On the other hand, he approves of how New Jersey introduced sports betting, which included NCAA wagering. “The success they had was including NCAA. Revenues will drop dramatically if you don’t have that. But we have to insulate NCAA players and provide safeguards and make sure the technology we have in place can monitor that.”

He said the committee chairs “aren’t listening to the noise to just put something out there. I respect wholeheartedly how they’re going through the process. I also support our governor. As a state we have to catch up to the 21st century. That includes the lottery—to do things to compete in a virtual world. The governor’s said he’d like to see a cashless system put forward for the lottery as well.”

Meanwhile, MGM Springfield is also lobbying the legislature for sports betting. It’s no coincidence that the casino reported less than ecstatic revenues in 2019, and that former President Michael Mathis and CFO Courtney Wenlender were reassigned last month after those figures were released.

The new casino president, Chris Kelley, is taking steps to fight flatlining gaming revenues, reflected in the fact that that the casino employs 2,500 people, 500 fewer than MGM promised when it petitioned for a gaming license from the Massachusetts Gaming Commission.

William Hill U.S. announced a partnership deal with CBS Sports on February 10 that makes the Las Vegas-based sportsbook operator the official sports betting partner and wagering data provider all of the network’s online platforms.

Under the deal, CBS will utilize William Hill’s data and odds, and the sportsbook operator will have the exclusive rights to promote its brand across CBS Sports’ range of digital properties, including CBS Sports Fantasy. CBS Sports Digital is considered the second-largest sports property in the U.S., with more than 80 million monthly users across its sites and mobile apps.

William Hill CEO Joe Asher said the deal “will allow us to expand the brand across America quickly and efficiently.”

The announcement is the latest agreement pairing sports betting or casino operators with traditional media outlets in order to find another vehicle to grow audience engagement from both sports bettors and sports fans.

Financial terms of the agreement between William Hill and CBS were not disclosed, according to CDC Gaming Reports.

“We really felt this was the right deal for us,” Asher said in an interview. “The deal gives us the ability to tap into a database. CBS also has tens of millions of social followers. They have the eyeballs, and they have customers we want to reach.”

The partnership also includes opportunities to feature William Hill’s data, odds and markets across CBS television programming.

“The power of our distribution, combined with the strength of our brands and the expertise of William Hill, has us well positioned to tap into the explosive growth of the legal sports betting industry in the U.S.,” said Jeffrey Gerttula, general manager of CBS Sports Digital.

The partnership will begin in March on CBS Sports digital platforms, with a full rollout planned for the fantasy football season.

CBS Sports Digital offerings include SportsLine, a subscription platform for game picks and predictions; CBSSports.com; 24/7 streaming network CBS Sports HQ, which features the nightly SportsLine show focused on sports betting; CBS Sports Fantasy; CBS Sports apps; and 247Sports.

Florida Senate President Bill Galvano said 2020 could be the year of positive developments in gambling in the state. He’s been meeting with House Speaker Jose Oliva, state Senator Travis Hutson and state Rep. Mike LaRosa to discuss gambling, but cautioned residents, “It’s premature to believe that there is a negotiated deal between the chambers. That has not occurred yet.”

Last year, state Senator Wilton Simpson and Hutson reached an agreement with the Seminole Tribe of Florida after Ron DeSantos became governor of Florida. The tribe still holds a monopoly on casino gambling in the state. Simpson had initially rejected a plan between the tribes and the governor but this year seems more open to a proposal that would legalize sports betting at tribal casinos, nontribal horse and dog racetracks and jai alai frontons.

Hutson said negotiations with the Seminole Tribe reached a positive point last spring. But since then, he said, “There has been nothing inked in pen or put in writing that we’ve agreed to. But we do feel like we’ve moved a lot closer towards being able to say that we’re in lockstep and key, and then we will go see the governor. But at this time, we’re not there.”

Tribal officials refuse to participate in negotiations due to designated player card games that continue to be offered at card rooms in Miami-Dade and Broward counties. Slots are not allowed in those counties but the lucrative designated player games provide thousands of jobs. The tribe claims the games violate the 2010 tribal-state gaming compact that gave the tribe exclusive rights to offer cards games like blackjack. It filed a lawsuit in federal court over the situation, and a federal judge agreed with the tribe, but the matter is pending appeal.

However, by including the Seminoles in a new agreement, the legislation would seem to bypass a constitutional amendment passed in 2018, giving voters exclusive rights to authorize any gambling expansion in the state. The amendment did not extend to tribal property.

Both chambers of the New York State legislature are mounting a full-court press to include mobile sports betting in the state budget.

State Assemblyman Gary Pretlow told LegalSportsReport.com that he’ll deliver a letter to Speaker Carl Heastie this week that asks not just for mobile wagering but expedited downstate casino licenses in the Assembly budget.

This marks the first effort on the Assembly side to join the Senate. Last year, Senator Joseph Addabbo Jr. succeeded in getting the sports betting expansion language into the Senate budget, but it wasn’t enough to get it into the final package.

“I’m pushing hard in my house, and I know the senator is pushing hard in his house, to get this in the budget,” Pretlow said. “The state is supposedly looking at a $4 billion to $6 billion deficit this year, and this would go a long way to reduce that.”

While Pretlow doesn’t think policy should be part of the budget, if that’s the only way to get it done, so be it, he said. “This is more fiscal than policy, to alleviate some of the pressures we have with our shortfall.”

Will Governor Andrew Cuomo be swayed?

“This is not the time to come up with creative, although irresponsible, revenue sources to solve a problem which doesn’t really exist,” Cuomo said in his budget address.

Mobile sports betting wouldn’t solve the sizable New York budget deficit. Estimates suggest it would add about $100 million in revenue for the state. Speeding up the issuance of three licenses for casinos around the New York City area could make that between $1.5 billion and $2 billion. Pretlow noted two offers on the table of half a billion dollars each from existing facilities in the state to become full-fledged casinos, adding he is asking for them to increase their offers.

This is a big enough number to put pressure on the governor, if both chambers include the gambling expansions in their one-house budget proposals.

Pretlow said he has 71 members of the Assembly in favor of having mobile New York sports wagering in the budget. He needs five more votes to clear a majority, and he’s confident he can get there.

“Before the budget is printed, I will speak to the entire Democratic Conference and get them on board to doing it,” Pretlow said. “I think that will put pressure on the speaker to get on board. He’s not a fan of gambling, period, but he’s also swayed by the opinion of the entire conference.”

New York must have a budget in place by April 1.

Mobile sports betting’s chances to make the budget will become clearer by the middle of March when the Assembly finalizes its budget proposal. If the Assembly joins the Senate in pushing for gambling expansions in the budget, the spotlight will be on Cuomo to make a decision. “He’ll be hard-pressed to veto it,” Pretlow said. “He can say he didn’t want to do it, but the legislature did it.”

Missouri House Bill 2088 is set to move to the House floor, even if the scope of the contents changes.

The bill calls for state-wide retail and mobile sports betting with the mobile piece tethered to a bricks-and-mortar sportsbook. Sports betting would take place via kiosk and the Missouri Lottery would be the regulator. The bill also deals in large part with video lottery terminals.

The proposal calls for a nine percent tax on gross gaming revenue, and includes a mandate for the use of official league data, but does not include an integrity fee or royalty. No state with legal sports betting has yet included an integrity fee defined as a cut off the top of the handle, and State Rep. Dan Shaul doesn’t see the need for it in Missouri, either, according to Sports Handle.

Even the mandate is negotiable in a state with four major professional sports teams, the Kansas City Chiefs, St. Louis Cardinals and Kansas City Royals, and the St. Louis Blues.

Three states have legalized sports betting with an official league data requirement to date—Tennessee, Illinois and Michigan. All are currently in the regulatory process and do not yet have live sports betting.

Shaul’s bill is the only bill to get voted to a chamber floor. Three different Senate bills are currently in the Appropriations Committee and the two other House bills were sent to the Special Committee on Government Oversight.

Shaul would like to see the bill move with enough time for the Senate to consider it before the General Assembly adjourns in May. There is no deadline in Missouri when a bill has to be approved in its chamber of origin.

The only real opposition could come from the anti-gambling lobby.

From an operator’s perspective, Shaul’s bill would be considered the best of the bunch, with a low tax rate and state-wide mobile. There are currently 13 licensed casinos in the state, and each would be entitled to have a mobile component. Shaul said he’s open to discussing untethered mobile betting, which would allow for an even more competitive marketplace.

“I’m willing to negotiate to get (the deal) done,” he said. “When I say I am not married to anything in this bill, I’m not. I’m just married to the idea of getting it to the altar of the governor’s desk.”

Ohio Governor Mike DeWine promises sports betting will come to the state, but not before public policy questions get some answers—such as how to address gambling addictions, whether bets will be allowed on mobile phone apps, and whether bets can be made on in-state inter-collegiate sports.

“I have not weighed in on these. I will at some point. Again, these are questions that the public needs to look at and I would encourage anyone who cares about this…to weigh in with their legislators and weigh in with us,” DeWine said earlier this month.

House Bill 194 and Senate Bill 111 each seek to legalize sports betting, though they would take different regulatory approaches. HB194 would give oversight duties to the Ohio Lottery while SB111 would give them to the Casino Control Commission.

According to the Dayton Daily News, SB-111 would permit current casino and racino license holders the ability to offer sports betting in person, online and via mobile devices. Betting on intercollegiate contests would be allowed but not on high school sports, said bill sponsor, State Senator John Eklund.

But public and private colleges and universities oppose legalizing betting on intercollegiate sports. In a letter signed by presidents of 14 public and 30 private universities, they argued that legal betting on college sports could compromise the integrity of the athletic programs, increase underage gambling and put additional pressure on students.

Another letter signed by athletic directors of Ohio’s 13 Division I NCAA institutions argues against legalizing sports betting on college athletics.

If state leaders insist on legalizing sports betting on collegiate sports, the athletic directors recommend multiple restrictions, including limiting wagers to the outcome of games, prohibiting wagers using student financial aid money and prohibiting wagers by athletes and university athletics staff.

At one point, the major professional sports leagues opposed the very idea of sports betting outside of Las Vegas. My how times have changed.

According to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, the heads of the city’s four professional teams have remained firmly behind the push for the legalization of online sports betting in Georgia.

Steve Koonin, president and CEO of the Atlanta Hawks, told a group of more than 100 journalists and business people that he didn’t know which legislator would bring the proposed legislation to the floor or when.

But Braves CEO Derek Schiller expected it to happen “very soon.” The Falcons and Atlanta United are also backing the move.

Team executives contend that sports gambling is happening in the state, but not legally. The NFL estimates that $1.5 billion is already being gambled illegally in Georgia yearly. Legalizing it will allow the state to regulate it, tax it and limit it to online, they told the Atlanta Press Club.

Such gaming will also help create more engaged fans, leagues said, something critical in an age of declining ratings for traditional sports broadcasts.

But gambling opponents argue that it will exacerbate social problems associated with the industry, such as family income disruption. Gambling would become as easy as sending a text on the smartphone in your pocket.

At least with a casino in a fixed place, people have to drive there, which can create a barrier, said Virginia Galloway, a Georgia lobbyist and the regional director of the Faith and Freedom Coalition.

“With a phone, it is like you have a casino in your pocket 24 hours a day, seven days a week,” she said.

Koonin and friends want a bill that limits gambling to professional sports, not college, and bets could be made on anything from who makes the next three-pointer to which team will win. Gamblers would have to deposit money in their gaming accounts to bet, so no one would be betting on borrowed money.

But Galloway pointed to studies by former Reagan White House economic adviser, Earl Grinols—author of “Gambling in America: Costs and Benefits”—who estimated that every dollar spent gambling brings $3 in community costs.

“What I am worried about is the young father who is not buying clothes or food for his family because he is addicted to this,” she said.

Despite the pros and cons, champions of sports betting need to step up soon. Any new legislation would have to be introduced before March 12.

Seven Colorado casinos have reportedly filed applications to get master licenses for sports betting. These licenses will give each an opportunity to operate sportsbooks that are not only located in casinos but also available online and for mobile users.

The Denver Post published a report discussing the state of affairs on sports betting. Voters approved the legislation in November.

According to the report, the legislation states official sports betting procedures could begin on May 1, and casinos were quick to apply for a license. To operate an on-site sportsbook or make deals with betting operators to create online and mobile offers, all casinos must have a master license.

The seven who expressed an interest: the Double Eagle Hotel and Casino, Midnight Rose Hotel and Casino, JP McGill’s Hotel and Casino, Saratoga Casino, Monarch Casino Resort Spa, The Brass Ass Casino, and Dostal Alley Casino.

The Colorado Limited Gaming Control Commission will decide which casinos will receive the master license. Once granted, casinos will be able to offer wagering, even eSports. In exchange, the gambling halls pay 10 percent of their betting earnings to the state. The state hopes to earn approximately $29 million a year.

According to Buddy Schmalz, co-owner of Dostal Alley Casino in Central City, said casinos needed separate licenses for physical and online sportsbooks. Double Eagle already signed a deal with PointsBet USA, a company from Australia which would probably oversee both online and land-based sports betting.

IMG Arena has secured the rights to provide live NHL streaming to U.S. sportsbook partners. As a result, legal sportsbooks will be able to offer customers live video of select out-of-market hockey games.

The agreement would help drive engagement for NHL fans, according to IMG. The company has streamed NHL games to European partners for several years.

“The NHL is a highly-valued asset in our portfolio,” said Freddie Longe, managing director of IMG Arena. “We are proud to expand this successful partnership to offer one of the largest U.S. sports to our growing customer base of sportsbooks.”

According to Legal Sports Report, the contract also marks the latest expansion in the U.S. for IMG, which also provides official data for tennis. In addition, the London-based company has data deals with the UFC and PGA Tour, although it has yet to announce any operator partners for those feeds.

Live streaming has been successful in driving betting turnover in Europe. In 2019, more than 175 million hours of IMG content was watched by 56 million unique viewers around the globe.

The NHL said the deal was part of its progressive approach to sports betting. The league already boasts official betting partnerships with MGM Resorts, FanDuel Sportsbook and William Hill.

“We are excited about the expansion of our international relationship with IMG Arena into the U.S.,” said Steve McArdle, NHL executive vice president of digital media and strategic planning. “The NHL has taken a progressive approach to sports betting, and this live game streaming opportunity with IMG Arena provides another innovative touch point for fan engagement.”

Hockey is currently a relatively small betting sport, accounting for a low single-digit share of New Jersey revenues in January.

Less than four months after Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer signed a bill legalizing sports betting, the state’s commercial and tribal casinos hope to accept their first bets in time for March Madness. The Michigan Gaming Control Board will oversee the implementation of the state’s sportsbooks.

For Michigan State students looking to place bets, the two casinos closest to East Lansing are FireKeepers in Battle Creek, and Soaring Eagle in Mt. Pleasant, both tribal.

“We are still hashing out the specifics, but we hope to be up and running very soon,” Dustin Ploehn, FireKeepers Rewards Club manager who oversees the sportsbook, told WKAR at Michigan State.

The application and licensing process is extensive.

“Right now, we are in the process of vetting applications,” said Mary Kay Bean, a spokeswoman for the gaming board.

Bean said that each casino will have the freedom to develop its own apps for mobile sports betting.

“The casinos will be able to kind of do their own thing when it comes to mobile,” Bean said. “Of course, all of the software will have to be approved, but each casino will be a little different.”

The tax rate is 8.4 percent for in-person bets made in casinos. For online betting, the rate fluctuates between 20 and 28 percent, depending on the adjusted gross receipts. The tax revenue generated will go to a variety of places. In the Detroit casinos, 30 percent will be earmarked for the city, 65 percent will go to the Lawful Sports Betting Fund, which appropriates a minimum $500,000 per year to the Compulsive Gaming Prevention Fund. Another $2 million will annually go to the First Responders Presumed Coverage Fund, and the remaining tax revenue will go to the State School Aid Fund.

The tribal casino tax revenue will be similarly allocated, with 90 percent of in-person betting money going to the Lawful Sports Betting Fund and 10 percent to the Michigan Strategic Fund. Seventy percent of online betting tax revenue in tribal casinos will go to the State Internet Gaming Fund, 20 percent will go to the local jurisdiction governing body for services, and 10 percent will go the Michigan Strategic Fund.

Mississippi launched sports betting in August, 2018 but restricted wagering to on-property sites. Under new legislation filed by Rep. Cedric Burnett, limited mobile access could be included if the casinos desired, but the app would only work while bettors are physically at the casino.

To date, no casino has launched an app, Allen Godfrey, the executive director of the Mississippi Gaming Commission, told the Biloxi Sun-Herald. Godfrey said the cost to launch the apps served as an impediment, especially when customers were already at the casino.

Burnett’s bill would allow any licensed casino to establish an online sports betting platform. The Mississippi Gaming Commission lists 24 current casino licensees, so the online market could be robust. Mobile sports bets would be taxed at 6 percent of revenue when operators report more than $134,000 in a month. Retail sports betting is typically taxed at 12 percent, with 8 percent to the state and 4 percent to the casino’s local government.

Outside Tennessee, which has yet to launch, none of Mississippi’s border states offer mobile sports betting. Arkansas only offers retail betting. That means the state could be getting tax revenue from sports bettors in Arkansas, Alabama, Florida and Louisiana. They would only have to cross into the state and complete the registration on their phone to begin placing bets.

The state took nearly $370 million in bets last year. That generated just $44.5 million in operator revenue and $5.3 million in tax revenue.

Washington could be the first Western state to legalize sports betting this year. If so, it would join Nevada, Colorado and Oregon—and the wagers were already legal in Oregon, which was exempted from the federal sports betting ban that the U.S. Supreme Court ended in May 2018.

Although several bills are active, legislators in the Evergreen State appear more likely to adopt a bill that limits sports betting to tribes, despite the best efforts of the owner of the largest number of commercial casinos, and who wants a piece of the action.

The bill seen as having the best chance of survival is HB 2638, which the House Appropriations Committee held hearings on last week, along with dozens of other bills. Lawmakers must act quickly in order for the bill to be viable this session, which ends March 13.

The bill allows for wagering on professional and college sports, Olympic contests and esports but still bans any games involving Washington colleges and universities.

The committee voted 25-7 to advance the bill to the floor. Before the vote, tribal leaders spoke in favor of the bill, which they said would keep revenues from sportsbook in the state. They also argued that the bill would not be an large expansion of gaming and would be limited in scope because online sports betting wouldn’t be allowed.

Kevin Zeniskek, executive director of casino operations for the Northern Quest Casino, which is owned by the Kalispel tribe, testified, “Passing this bill will keep sports betting revenue in Washington state, and that is vastly different than other bills you’ve heard. It will help the tribes to continue to offer vital services and jobs.”

Puyallup Chairman David Bean told the lawmakers that Indian tribes have been “trusted partners” who offer a safe, fair and controlled environment. “The legislation benefits all of Washington because tribal gaming benefits tribal and non-tribal communities alike,” said Bean. “You know us. This is our shared homeland. We live here. We work here. We invest our resources here in Washington. And we ask that you adopt an approach to sports betting that maximizes the benefits to people and communities here in Washington.”

Maverick Gaming owner Eric Persson—who owns 19 of the total 44 card room casinos, the largest group of commercial casinos in the state—is backing a rival bill that is currently spinning its wheels in both the House and Senate. Persson is a Washington native but has been building a rapidly expanding empire of casinos that now includes four states. His bill would allow sports betting at a variety of venues, including tribal, racetracks and card room casinos. He claims it would bring in $50 million annually in state revenue. He also argues that his small, intimate card rooms don’t pose a threat to Indian casinos since they attract a different set of patrons.

During his testimony he mocked the idea that he is a carpetbagger. “It’s fun to hear that I am an out-of-state bogeyman,” he quipped.

Although he has reached out to tribes to try to bring them into the bill he backs that would include both tribes and commercial casinos, his own tribe, the Shoalwater Bay Tribe, has said that it backs HB 2638.

Maverick employee Vicki Christophersen also testified, and criticized the speed with which HB 2638 is being pushed—while arguing that only by offering an online sport betting element will illegal activities be discouraged. “This bill does nothing to eliminate the illicit market,” she said. “This bill is seeking to move really quickly without enough thought. This is an attempt to rush through an issue without a level playing field.”

Since Maverick began backing a rival bill, tribal lobbyists have spent more than $265,000 to push their favored bills. The Senate is giving precedence to the House in pushing its version of a bill, and won’t go forward with its own bill SB 6394 until the House version has been approved.

Senator Rebecca Saldana is optimistic about getting a bill to the governor’s desk this year. She told the Seattle Times, “Our intent was to have true companion bills all the way through. I think that ours is a mirror of theirs. And if it is a mirror, and we don’t do any more mucking around of their version, then it can go straight to the governor.’’

After the House vote its sponsor Rep. Strom Peterson told the Times, “I’m hoping to get this moving over to the Senate on a relatively fast timeline We’ll see if that happens, but with a very bi-partisan vote that we just had this evening, I think that helps.”

With the bipartisan support he has seen, Peterson calls the upcoming floor vote “a formality,” but added, “It’s a lift. I still need to talk to a lot of people about it and make everybody comfortable with it, because it is an expansion of gambling.”

The bill could reach Governor Jay Inslee by this spring.

Up until this point Washington has had among the most stringent gaming, or rather anti-gaming laws. For example, online gaming is a felony. Built-in procedural rules make it even harder with the requirement of a 60 percent supermajority to expand gaming.

There are 29 tribal casinos in Washington, with some of the largest being the Muckleshoot, Tulalip and Emerald Queen casinos.