A recent poll of 977 adult Georgians, including 853 registered voters, conducted by Abt SRBI for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, indicated 62 percent of registered voters support legalizing casino gambling to fund the HOPE scholarship.
Whether or not lawmakers will heed those results remains to be seen. However, the push has begun for a statewide voter referendum later this year instead of focusing on legislation regarding gambling expansion. That measure, House Bill 677, calls for up to six destination casino resort licenses in Atlanta (where two would be issued), Columbus, Macon, Savannah and South Georgia. But Governor Nathan Deal opposed the legislation and the state House and Senate committees that studied the issue last year could not agree on a tax rate.
So, the bill’s author, state Rep. Ron Stephens declared, “I really firmly believe we’ve got to do something this year. We need to focus 100 percent on passing the constitutional amendment.” Stephens’ House Resolution 807 proposes a constitutional amendment allowing casino gaming in Georgia. Passage requires a two-thirds majority in both the House and Senate before the referendum would be placed on the November ballot. Deal’s signature would not be required. Stephens said, if the constitutional amendment passes, he will introduce enabling legislation in 2017 to establish casino gambling regulations. At a 12 percent tax rate, the casinos would bring in $239 million, enough to fully fund the HOPE scholarship program, Stephens said. “They were asking me before, ‘We need to do this in the bill and do that in the bill. But none of that stuff matters unless we can get the constitutional amendment passed,” he added.
Mike Griffin with the Georgia Baptist Convention said, “The social costs, many times, from the benefits of this type of revenue is three-to-one in the negative. So it’s simply something that we don’t need here in the state of Georgia.”
Meanwhile state Senator Vincent Fort filed legislation requiring disclosure of any amount or value for the purpose of influencing state lawmakers toward a vote to legalize casino gambling in Georgia. “Declare every red cent, not just contributions to lawmakers. Any penny they donate or they use in furtherance of bring casino gambling to Georgia, even if they give money to an organization for sponsorship of a dinner or band uniforms. Because they’re not doing it just out of the goodness of their hearts.”
More than 24 lobbyists have registered at state capitol as casino or gambling representatives. At least 17 of them represent MGM Resorts International.
