Last month, the Alabama House of Representatives passed House Bills 151 and 152 which would authorize a ballot referendum on casino gambling, a lottery and sports betting.
The bill now is being reviewed in the Senate where Minority Leader Bobby Singleton said, “The House sent us a bill that’s something we can work with.”
Alabama lawmakers have considered gaming bills in practically every legislative session since 2011, but the issue hasn’t been presented to voters since 1999, when they rejected a lottery. But Singleton told 1819 News 2024 could be different. He said he gives gambling legislation “a 70-30 chance of passing.”
Passage, however, requires 21 votes in the 34-member Senate; the House passed the gaming package in a 67-31 vote. State Senator Sam Givhan said he knows of at least 19 colleagues who would vote “no.” Givhan said he believes the gaming package permits too much, too soon, allowing seven commercial casinos, including three operated by the Poarch Band of Creek Indians, plus online sports betting and a state-run lottery that could participate in Powerball and Mega Millions.
Givhan told 1819, “I don’t know how many people have come up to me and said, ‘I want a lottery. I don’t want casinos.’ This idea that we’ve got to do all these different things and expand gambling dramatically in order to get a lottery, I think is bad public policy. But the people want it and all the states around us have it and they haven’t gone down the toilet yet. There are a lot of lawmakers who are hard ‘no’s’ on casino gaming, but say ‘I’ll vote for a lottery.’”
Both Senate President Pro Tempore Greg Reed and bill sponsor state Rep. Chris Blackshear believe the issue of expanded gambling should be decided by voters. Reed told 1819, “We’ve had a lot of debate related to gaming. I think you’re going to see legislation moving in the next couple of weeks. It’s an important topic.”
Blackshear noted currently “several hundred” illegal gambling venues operate in Alabama. “With this legislation, we would be eliminating 90 percent of those.” He added, “We can sit here and think we have the best bill there is, but it’s up to the citizens of Alabama and they haven’t voted since 1999.”
After a public hearing in the Senate Tourism and Economic Development Committee, state Senator Greg Albritton said he thought he had the votes in the committee to approve a bill, but no vote was taken. He added legislators put in a lot of work to find “a workable bill that is comprehensive in nature that will resolve the issues and give us the caps and controls and the collections of revenue that we need here in Alabama.”
Albritton told the Alabama Daily News, “There is a lot of interest in trying to find a path to passage. The concern is, what can we put together that is palatable and passable and also passable in the House and acceptable by the governor? And that’s going to be for my friends to figure out because I’ve already got the solution in hand.”
Governor Kay Ivey said she met recently with legislators to discuss the “good bill” from the House bill and ways to fix illegal gambling in the state. She said, “We’ve got to fix it, and we’ve got to get it right.” she said. Ivey has no constitutional role in passing a constitutional amendment but she could sign or reject the enabling legislation, which controls gambling tax revenue distribution and industry regulation. But a simple majority vote in the House and Senate could override the governor’s vetoes.
According to legislative projections, casino gambling, a lottery and sports betting would bring the state $935.6 million to $1.214 billion in annual revenue. In comparison, in 2023, Mississippi’s 26 casinos generated gross gaming revenue of $2.48 billion, a drop of $91.3 million or 3.5 percent. The state debuted in-person sports betting in 2018, and lawmakers there currently are considering adding online sports betting.
Louisiana’s 15 riverboats posted GGR of $1.76 billion in the 2023 fiscal year ending June 30, 2023, a 2 percent year-over-year decline.
Tennessee has offered residents online sports betting since November 2020, and the Seminole Tribe in Florida went live with retail and digital sports betting in late 2023. The only border state without legal wagering is Georgia but legislators there are reviewing multiple proposals for legalization.
The Alabama Legislature will adjourn May 20. Bills from this session will not carry over to 2025.
