David Rebuck, the longtime director of the New Jersey Division of Gaming Enforcement, will be honored with a Lifetime Achievement Award at the 27th Annual East Coast Gaming Congress (ECGC). The award will be presented on April 18, 2024 at the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino in Atlantic City.
ECGC is the longest-running gaming conference in the United States, and has only presented five Lifetime Achievement awards in its 27-year history. Recent recipients included veteran gaming executives Virginia McDowell and Tim Wilmott.
“Dave Rebuck’s tenure at the Division of Gaming Enforcement, beginning in 2011, coincided with an explosion of new technologies that presented enormous opportunities for the gaming industry as well as great challenges for regulators,” said ECGC co-founder Michael Pollock. “He addressed each and every challenge, from iGaming to sports betting and beyond, while maintaining New Jersey’s unyielding focus on gaming integrity.”
“As a result of his leadership, the gaming industry has grown and so has New Jersey’s reputation as a jurisdiction that knows how to regulate effectively,” said ECGC co-founder Lloyd D. Levenson, chairman and CEO of the Cooper Levenson law firm.
In 2011, Rebuck’s tenure at DGE began with the examination of its entire set of casino regulations to ensure consistency and to eliminate redundancy and unnecessary mandates. A complete new set of regulations was adopted in December 2011.
Rebuck played a central role in the legalization and implementation of internet gaming in New Jersey in 2013, and he was also at the forefront of New Jersey’s efforts to legalize sports wagering. Governor Phil Murphy signed New Jersey’s sports wagering legislation on June 11, 2018, and the first sports wagers in the state took place just three days later. Notably, Rebuck was inducted into the Sports Betting Hall of Fame earlier this year.
Rebuck also led DGE through the openings of the Hard Rock and Ocean Resort casinos, tackling the extensive licensing and operational challenges of opening two new casinos on the same day, June 28, 2018.
