Ballot Offers a Vegas Vice for Miami

Gov. Jeb Bush has thrown himself at the last minute into a fray over broadening legalized gambling in Florida, warning voters in the two most populous counties that they will be making a sucker bet if they vote today to allow Las Vegas-style slot machines.

If the voters in Miami-Dade and Broward counties approve, five South Florida dog and horse tracks and two jai alai frontons that already allow parimutuel betting would have the right to install the machines, subject to conditions that would be set by the Legislature.

The businesses and their allies, in a well-funded campaign, contend that the new gambling would bring a host of benefits, including thousands of new jobs and hundreds of millions of dollars annually for the state’s public schools.

Bush has accused the pro-slots lobby of dishonestly portraying gambling as an economic panacea. If the machines are permitted, crime and traffic in the two counties would increase, he said.

Moreover, the Republican governor said, it’s not James Bond and the rest of the tuxedo-clad set who would likely head to the greyhound track to drop a fistful of change.

Instead, “it’s going to be people of moderate income getting in buses with coins in their pocket, showing up and sitting on a stool,” Bush, the president’s brother, said last week. “As I understand it, the loss factor for them is 90%. This is a bad deal.”

Former state Education Commissioner Jim Horne, a Republican, has been one of the high-profile advocates of slot machines. It’s not that he is a gambling enthusiast, Horne has explained, but it’s because Florida’s public coffers receive nothing from existing forms of gambling at Indian casinos or aboard ships that carry passengers on day cruises from the state’s ports to beyond U.S. territorial waters. Many local politicians in South Florida have also come out in support of the machines.

According to one pro-slots lobby group, in the first year alone tax revenue from the machines would yield at least $438 million for schools across Florida, which ranks 43rd in the nation in the amount of money spent per pupil.

Fred Havenick, president of Miami’s Flagler Dog Track, which will be affected by today’s vote, argued that saying “yes” to slots made sense on many levels.

“Gambling is already here in Dade and Broward, untaxed, unregulated and uncontrolled,” Havenick said in an interview. “There is no ability to stop what we have. Therefore, why not tax it and provide $500 million for schools, regulate it so people know they are getting a fair shake?” An estimated 18,000 jobs, Havenick said, could be created by the boost given to tourism and entertainment.

Campaigning in the Miami and Fort Lauderdale areas Friday, Bush dismissed the vision of a looming economic and educational funding bonanza as a mirage. Instead of helping public schools, Bush said, tax revenue from slots would be allocated to all of Florida’s 67 counties.

Bush may have gotten involved in the issue too late to help opponents of slot machines. Most indications are that in local elections in which a modest turnout is predicted, the referendum question will be approved handily. Last week, the main pro-slots campaign committee, Yes for Better Schools and Jobs, reported it had amassed nearly $7 million in contributions, while Bush estimated opponents had raised less than 5% of that.

Since the 1970s, Florida voters had rejected three separate plans for the expansion of gambling. But in November, they switched direction and approved a constitutional amendment that empowered the residents of Miami-Dade and Broward counties to allow slot machines at existing parimutuel facilities.

Even if voters approve, many blanks would remain to be filled in by Tallahassee lawmakers, including how many and what types of slot machines would be permitted, what percentage of the take would go to the state government in taxes, and how the proceeds would be allocated.

In an open letter posted on the website of No Casinos, an organization opposed to the slot machines, Bush accused the measure’s advocates of deceptive advertising in a push to expand gambling in the nation’s fourth-largest state.

The next step, the governor predicted, would be a demand from Indian tribes to upgrade their existing casinos into full-blown Las Vegas-style operations. At present, the Seminole and Miccosukee tribes are limited to low-stakes poker games and bingo-type slots, but under federal treaties could assert the right to engage in the most sophisticated type of gambling that is legal in their state.

Other states have grappled with the slot machine issue.

In November, California voters rejected two ballot initiatives, one which would have expanded slot machines to card clubs and horse tracks, and one which would have expanded tribes’ slot machine casinos.

In Maryland, where the Republican governor wants slot machines, the state House and Senate have yet to reconcile different versions of their bills.