Delaware’s casinos are making their third pitch in as many years for government relief in a market battered by a proliferation of gaming across the Northeast.
A group known as the Video Lottery Advisory Council, made up of executives of the three casinos, representatives of slot manufacturers and a Delaware Lottery official, is expected next month to formally recommend a number of options.
They include changing the current revenue-sharing formula, lowering tax rates when revenue is down and increasing them when the market is growing.
The council also will suggest that the state take on all slot vendor costs. Currently, the state pays 75 percent, or about $9 million.
A third option would eliminate the annual table game license fee of $3 million and cut the tax rate on table revenue from 29.4 percent to 15 percent, or instead of the tax cut the state would share the cost of vendor fees.
A final recommendation calls for implementing marketing and capital credits to make it practicable for the casinos to invest more in their operations.
Two separate bills to provide some measure of relief to the casinos failed to gain momentum over the past legislative session.
“Let’s hope with a new governor, with a new administration, if we come in with November recommendations, that somehow this gets put in the budget,” said Dover Downs Hotel & Casino President and CEO Ed Sutor.
