Arkansas considers casino amendment
The Natural State is collecting signatures to include a constitutional amendment on November’s ballot to authorise two casinos.
US.- There are currently seven states in the country that don’t spend any money to support gambling addiction prevention and treatments, and Arkansas is one of them. A proposal to allow two casinos in the state and put US$200k into gambling addiction services is currently circulating in the state to obtain signatures.
Groups in favour of allowing two casinos in Arkansas – one in Russellville and one in Jefferson County – are collecting signatures to put a constitutional amendment on the November ballot, which would also put US$200,000 into a fund to treat gambling addiction problems.
However, the Director of the National Council on Gambling Prevention (NCGP) Keith Whyte said: “Arkansas suffers from a greater prevalence of gambling problems than the national average and has more severe problems due to the lack of state services. What we would expect is that the introduction of even more gambling in Arkansas would increase an already high level of problems without any of the countervailing preventative and protective measures.”
Approximately two per cent of Arkansas have a gambling problem, and Whyte believes that US$3.5 million could be a good number to fight that addiction.
Nate Steel, legal counsel for the ballot committee behind the effort, said that he’s not worried about the impact that the two casinos could have: “We don’t anticipate that the licensing of two new casinos would substantially increase the amount of compulsive gambling. But we do think it’s an opportunity to raise funding for compulsive gambling. That may be completely unrelated to casinos, but at least we will have that,” said Steel.
“In the amendment, the Arkansas Racing and Gaming Commission is charged with the task of regulating casino licences. In the granting of licences, the Racing Commission is instructed to provide a minimum of $200,000 for compulsive gambling disorder treatment and compulsive gambling disorder educational programs,” said Steel.
