The Nebraska Legislature’s General Affairs Committee recently heard testimony about allowing keno to be played on mobile phones, which would help bars and keno parlors compete with new casinos scheduled to open next year.
Currently players pick numbers on a sheet of paper and submit them to a keno operator, usually a bartender or parlor employee. The game has been legal for decades. But now industry and city officials are concerned they’ll lose revenue to casinos, which will be allowed under a constitutional amendment voters approved last year.
The provision, included in a larger gambling bill, would allow keno players to bet using their mobile phones via an app linked to their bank accounts. Players could not use credit cards on keno bets and geofencing technology would limit play to locations where keno is permitted.
Bellevue City Finance Director Richard Severson said keno has generated $7.5 million in local revenue over the last decade. City officials have used the funds to upgrade parks and promote economic development, among other initiatives. “Needless to say, that $7.5 million was very helpful without us raising property taxes or raising the revenue some other way,” Severson said.
Jack Cheloha, a lobbyist for the city of Omaha, said his city has used its keno revenue to buy police cars, pay for cleanup projects and pay off lease-purchase bonds on TD Ameritrade Park, the downtown baseball arena that hosts the College World Series.
Nate Grasz, policy director for the Nebraska Family Alliance, said the measure is an attempt to offer a new form of gambling that goes beyond last year’s casino legalization measure. It’s likely to disproportionately impact the state’s poorest residents, he said. “Government should not actively seek to willfully cheat its own citizens,” Grasz commented.
Some lawmakers said they were concerned a mobile app would make it easier for compulsive gamblers to empty out their bank accounts. Others questioned whether casinos will actually hurt the keno industry once they’re open. State Senator Tom Brandt said he doesn’t see keno games based in bars and casinos as competitors. “My experience is that regulars of bars go in there to drink beer, and keno happens to be there. It’s sort of a different crowd than those who would go to a casino,” he said.
