The Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation is attempting to repeal a rule regarding designated player games, also known as banked card games, which the regulators approved in 2012. Gambling operators in West Palm Beach, Jacksonville, Melbourne and Miami are challenging the repeal, claiming the games bring in million annually. However, the card games, offered in nearly every parimutuel that operates a cardroom in Florida, play a role in the state’s dispute with the Seminole Tribe of Florida, and cardroom operators believe that’s why gambling regulators want to change the rule.
The parimutuels claim regulators suddenly changed the rule after Governor Rick Scott and the Seminole Tribe signed a proposed $3 billion compact in December. The legislature rejected the agreement and it did not go into effect. The state and the tribe sued each other over the banked card games, after a five-year deal giving the tribe exclusive rights to operate the games expired last summer.
At a hearing held in May about a complaint involving the Jacksonville Kennel Club, also known as BestBet Jacksonville, attorney Chris Kise, representing Tampa Bay Downs, said, “It’s a blatant reversal of policy for mercenary reasons with no regard to the statute or the impacted businesses and employees. They’re trying to wash their hands of these issues with no consequence or accountability.”
More recently, at a hearing over a separate administrative challenge about complaints filed against the gambling operators in December, a month before regulators proposed eliminating the rule, attorney John Lockwood, on behalf of six parimutuels, told Administrative Law Judge Gary Early the regulatory department’s Division of Pari-Mutuel Wagering changed its banked card games policy without following the proper process. “Our position is the only way they can change that interpretation is through rule-making, and that’s not what they’re doing here. Instead of embodying a new rule they’re relying on a new policy that would prohibit the games previously approved.” Early responded, “The division had a rule. It appeared to be ineffective from the division’s standpoint. Why wouldn’t the division adopt a rule to resolve issues that it found to be problematic so that everybody was working off the same standard?”
Department of Business and Professional Regulation lawyer William Hall said regulators determined they needed some guidance from the courts before proceeding. Previously, Hall had said, “The best option we could see was, let’s pull these rules back, enforce the statute, get a ruling one way or the other on what constitutes a banked game and what doesn’t, and then we can go from there.”
Department of Business and Professional Regulation Deputy Secretary Jonathan Zacham, who headed the division overseeing gambling when the rule repeal was proposed in January, said the agency is trying to work with the industry to clarify the situation. “Some of the actual application of these things, and when they’re put into motion, are definitely different than what the division thought, and probably different than what people in the industry that helped create the rules probably thought, too.”
Meanwhile, the St. Johns County, Florida commission was set to vote on a proposal from BestBet to allow a referendum on the November ballot asking voters if they want to allow gambling. However, BestBet officials told commissioners they were not ready to go forward with the proposal. County Attorney Pat McCormack said a lack of community support could have influenced BestBet’s decision.
Commissioner Bill McClure stated, “The majority of people, I would say, are against it. My research has shown that gambling facilities work in areas that are economically depressed. However, St. Johns County is not economically depressed.”
Bestbet spokesperson Susie Wiles said, “It became clear to us that it was not going to happen. And hence the withdraw. The request was not to ask the commissioners to weigh in on the project. The request was to ask the voters what their opportunity was. Anytime you deny that type of thing, I’m not sure it’s fair or right.” Wiles added, “Six other counties do have it on the ballot this election cycle. It’s going well. We won’t know. We will look to Duval, where the city council did put it on the ballot. It’s just sort of a shame that St. Johns voters won’t get the same opportunity.”
Bestbet hired the Innovation Group to prepare a report on the proposed $166 million casino’s economic impact on St. Johns County. The report stated the venue would generate $329 million in 2020, its first year of operation. The county would receive $4.7 million from its 1.5 percent revenue-sharing agreement. The facility would have 1,400 employees with a payroll of $$48 million. Besides offering slot machines, the proposed venue would have had a hotel, restaurant and bar.
McCormack said commissioners did not want the community to feel like the casino issue would come and go, so it will not be addressed again for the rest of the year. “I think, at this point, with the uncertainty in the Florida Supreme Court, it was probably prudent to not call the question to bring it forward at this time,” he said.
The state Supreme Court is considering if slots can be allowed in counties where voters have approved them, or if legislative approval is necessary.
Bestbet currently operates Bestbet Orange Park and Bestbet Jacksonville. The company is moving forward with a ballot proposal to allow voters determine if they want slots at its existing poker room in Arlington near Jacksonville.
