An audit of an agency set up to address gambling addiction in the state of Maryland revealed that mismanagement of the agency led to a problem gambling help website actually being used to promote casinos.
The July 9 audit of Maryland’s Behavioral Health Administration reportedly revealed lax oversight of hundreds of millions of dollars in grants, the most serious being the fate of mdproblemgambling.com, a website meant to guide problem gamblers to professional mental health services. According to the audit, officials allowed the domain name to lapse, and the domain was taken over by an operator that used it to publish promotional material for Las Vegas casinos.
State auditor Greg Hook wrote in a letter to lawmakers that the website snafu was “an egregious example of lack of oversight.”
