Gambling interests frequently push for gambling expansion issues to be decided via referenda, under the guise of "letting the people vote." This may sound like good, old-fashioned democracy at work; it is not. Such referenda allow gambling promoters to unleash a torrent of media spending that corrupts the democratic process by precluding fair debate. Citizens are inundated with the gambling industry's pie-in-the-sky promises of jobs, tourism and economic development, which drown out the truth about legalized gambling's devastating social and economic costs. Following are but a few examples of the huge disparity in spending between gambling proponents and opponents evidenced in 1996- 2002 gambling referenda campaigns.
* In Ohio, gambling proponents spent $8.5 million on a failed campaign to legalize eight dockside casinos at various locations around the state. Opponents spent $1.1 million.1
* In Arkansas, gambling boosters spent a total of $9.2 million on various proposed referenda that would have expanded gambling in the form of casinos, a state lottery, video lottery terminals and charitable bingo. Gambling opponents spent $500,000. (Out-of-state casino companies spent an additional $1.2 million to defeat expansion in Arkansas in order to protect their own interests.)2
* Louisiana gambling interests outspent opponents by a margin of nearly 200 to 1 in statewide local-option elections to decide the fate of riverboat casinos, the New Orleans land-based casino and video poker machines. Gambling expenditures totaled $10.5 million, while opponents spent $53,000.3
* Pro-casino groups in Michigan spent more than $10 million in narrowly winning a referendum to bring casinos to Detroit.4 Opponents spent but a small fraction of that amount.
* Washington state gambling proponents outspent opponents $1.7 million to $12,000 in a failed attempt to legalize slot machines at tribal casinos.5
* In 1994, casino promoters spent a staggering $16.5 million in a failed effort to bring dozens of casinos to Florida. Opponents spent $1.7 million.6
* Missouri gambling interests spent nearly $15 million on two 1994 referenda (one failed, one successful) to allow full-scale casino gambling on riverboats. Opponents spent $395,000.7
Footnotes
1 Office of the Secretary of State Ohio, Campaign Finance Department.
2 Rachel O'Neal, "Gambling Effort: $9.2 Million Bad Bet," Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, Jan. 9. 1997.
3 Brad Cooper, "Gambling Interests Spent $10 Million on '96 Elections," Shreveport Times, Jan. 21, 1997.
4 Melinda Wilson, "Why Wasn't Whole State Opened for Casinos, Many Ask," Detroit News, June 19, 1997, p. A6.
5 Rob Carson, "Voters Again Say No to Slot Machines," (Tacoma, WA) News Tribune, Nov. 6, 1996.
6 Michael Griffin, "Court Clears Way for Casino Vote in '96," Orlando Sentinel Tribune, June 9, 1995.
7 Missouri Ethics Commission, "1994 Missouri Annual Campaign Finance Report."