TALLAHASSEE — Washington County may get its one-armed bandits after all.
A state Senate gaming panel revived the idea Monday as some lawmakers pushed to give counties that approved slots by local voter referenda the right to operate them.
In North Florida, Washington County, as well as Gadsden and Hamilton counties, have approved slot machines, but state Attorney General Pam Bondi has blocked them. Ebro Greyhound Park, just across the Bay County line, has shown off plans to add slot machines to its existing facilities, which include a dog track and card room.
State Sen. Jack Latvala, R-St. Petersburg, pushed the hardest on the panel to open up slots in these counties. He said six counties across the state consented to slots already but can’t use them.
Latvala said the voters’ will should be recognized and took his argument a step further. He said all other counties should have an equal opportunity for a referendum to get their own slots.
The committee plans to propose comprehensive legislation this year that will include a requirement that any gambling expansion be approved as a state constitutional amendment, requiring 60 percent of the vote. Latvala wants all counties to have a chance at slots without that requirement.
Palm Beach County senators, where slots are stalled by the Bondi decision, also pushed to allow the casino-style gambling machines.
Other lawmakers avoided the contentious issue, including the panel’s only Panhandle representative, Sen. Bill Montford, D-Tallahassee, whose district includes Calhoun and Gulf counties.
Comprehensive legislation
The committee and the public still haven’t seen the first draft of the comprehensive gaming legislation and what it will say about slots. Chairman Garrett Richter, R-Naples, ultimately will decide what goes into it and was noncommittal on the issue Monday.
“We just have to continue to weigh all the impact … that there is as we proceed in this,” he said.
His temerity comes even though Lee County, which he represents, also has its slots stalled because of Bondi’s decision. Richter, however, agreed that other counties should have a shot at their own referendum before the constitutional amendment requirement would take effect.
The constitutional amendment requirement is one of many provisions in the three-bill package that will come in proposed committee bills and be revealed Feb. 24.
Richter chose to delay making the bills’ text public Monday; instead, he opted to open up the panel for more discussion on the legislation, offering only details of the legislation’s current content.
Richter also reasserted his support for decoupling — ending a requirement that tracks run a minimum number of races to operate card rooms. Last week he got pushback from Latvala over fears about breeders’ and trainers’ jobs post-decoupling, but he suggested a phase-in approach Monday, and though he gave no details, that appeared to mollify Latvala.
Due to possible federal law conflicts on horse racing, the panel will address the dog and horse decoupling as separate measures.
The committee also reconfirmed its commitment to require tracks to report animal injuries.
Seminole Compact
The committee also voiced concerns over how the legislation would affect the Seminole Compact. The state government must renegotiate the banked card games portion of the compact by 2015; these games include blackjack and baccarat.
The concern is how much revenue the state would lose on the compact if it allowed a destination casino in Miami-Dade County and in Broward County. Both are included in the current legislation.
Palm Beach County senators still are pushing to get a destination casino in their county, but Richter wasn’t interested. He said the state can’t have “carte blanche expansion of casinos.”
The proposed legislation also would create a five-member “Gaming Control Board.” The panel would oversee all gaming throughout the state, except for the Florida Lottery. The members would be appointed by the governor for staggered four-year terms and former lawmakers could not be picked for three years.
Some lawmakers opposed the Lottery’s exclusion from the gaming commission. Latvala said the state constitution limits the number of state departments the Legislature can create and it’s getting pretty close to that ceiling already. He suggested putting the Lottery under the gaming commission to free up a department.
Meanwhile, Sen. Oscar Braynon, D-Miami Gardens, took a jab at the Republican-led Legislature proposing multiple layers of government expansion. He said he wasn’t sure about a provision allowing the state agriculture department to oversee bingo and other games when a gaming commission would exist. He also noted the state already has the Division of Pari-Mutuel Wagering.
“I would hope that if we are creating a new joint-oversight gaming department that we would try to condense things … but again that’s just me as the small-government Democrat that I am,” he said.