Arkansans will vote in November on a proposal to legalize casinos in Boone, Miller and Washington counties. Arkansas Secretary of State Mark Martin’s office said supporters of the proposed constitutional amendment turned in 100,977 valid signatures from registered voters; a minimum of 84,859 signatures were required to qualify for the ballot.
Arkansas Wins in 2016 spokesman Robert Coon said, “We’re excited that Arkansans will have the opportunity to vote on this important amendment this November.” Earlier the group said it had struck a deal with Cherokee Nation Entertainment to run the Washington County casino if voters approve the measure. Similar arrangements for the casinos in the other two counties have not been announced.
Coon said the measure provides oversight through a new commission. Also, the casinos would be subject to laws implementing the amendment. “What can’t be disputed is the tremendous impact that this amendment will have on the state of Arkansas in the form of new jobs, increased tourism and tens of millions of dollars in new tax revenue that can be utilized to pay for priorities such as education, roads and infrastructure, economic development, and future tax cuts,” he said.
Jerry Cox, head of the conservative Family Council Action Committee, said the measure would let a private company give itself a constitutionally protected gambling monopoly in the state, and take away local voters’ rights to decide if they want expanded gambling in their communities. “Even if every voter in these cities opposes the casinos, they could still be built if the amendment passes in the statewide vote this November,” Cox said.
Arkansas has a lottery and currently allows electronic gambling including video poker and blackjack at a Hot Springs horse track and a West Memphis dog track.
Republican Governor Asa Hutchinson recently said the state does not need more gambling. He added he’s concerned by a provision giving the limited liability corporations designated in the proposal control over who they could transfer the gambling rights to. “Even if you were going to casino gambling in Arkansas, this is not the means to accomplish it. If you’re going to have an expansion of gambling in Arkansas, and particularly the area of casinos, let the state regulate and select appropriate vendors for that purpose,” Hutchinson said.
Meanwhile in Nebraska, Secretary of State John Gale’s office confirmed all three petition drives to legalize casino gambling in the state have failed to reach the threshold of 80,032 valid signatures and therefore will not appear on the November ballot. Earlier Gale said a proposed constitutional amendment to allow casino gambling at horse racetracks did not make the ballot because of a lack of valid signatures. Now he said another measure to establish how games of chance are regulated only received 73,617 signatures and only 51,993 of those were valid. A second measure that regarding casino gaming revenue taxation only received 78,152 signatures and only 54,854 were accepted.
Gale said the three petitions presented a higher-than-normal error rate in collecting signatures, with duplicate signatures and signatures from people who were not registered voters or who signed petitions for a county where they were not registered.
Keep the Money in Nebraska, the pro-gambling group that sponsored the petitions, claimed it turned in about 130,000 signatures, but Gale said the petition actually had 119,666 total signatures. Scott Lautenbaugh, the group’s spokesman, acknowledged the group estimated the number of signatures and couldn’t account for the differences. But he added he did not fault the company hired to collect the petition signatures. He said he believed having three separate petitions was too complicated and took more time to collect signatures.
In 2004 Nebraskans defeated two casino measures—one proposed by the legislature and another ballot petition. In 2006, voters rejected a proposal to allow video keno devices.
