Thursday, June 28, 2012
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City urged to make a decision on video gaming

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[June 28, 2012]  Tuesday evening at the Lincoln City Council committee of the whole, Alderwoman Marty Neitzel said she had received a call from Shawn Taylor at Logan Lanes in Lincoln. He asked her if the city council would vote to approve video gambling in the city of Lincoln.
Around the room several other aldermen said they, too, had been receiving calls about the new state-permitted electronic gaming machines. It was concluded that everyone in the room with the exception of Mayor Keith Snyder had received similar calls.

In May, at the first meeting of the council this fiscal year, Snyder shared with the aldermen that the city currently has sufficient ordinances in place to prohibit the legalized gambling.

Snyder had read an article in the State Journal-Register that explained that many of the original ordinances in cities around the state were already sufficient to prohibit gambling. As a follow-up, he asked city attorney Bill Bates to contact the gaming commission and verify that the city of Lincoln was included in that statistic.

Bates heard from Emily Mattison, the acting deputy general counsel of the Illinois Gaming Board, that Snyder's conclusions were correct.

During that meeting it was Neitzel who then asked when the ordinance had been passed. Bates said the ordinance had been written in the mid-1960s and then amended in 1987 and 1997. He said he felt the original prohibition would have been written in the early version, and he doubted the amendments made in '87 and '97 would have had any effect on it.

Neitzel then emphasized no one on the current council would have been involved in making that decision.

The issue of video gaming or gambling came to the city in 2010.

The state of Illinois, looking to beef up its own revenues, had passed gaming laws that would legalize gaming with the use of new, state-approved video machines. With this new program, players would no longer be playing "for entertainment purposes only" but would be able to play and win money.

Business establishments where the games were located would benefit financially, just as they do now with the old-style machines, and in addition, the state would draw a share of the gaming proceeds.

The state's plan included making the current machines illegal. This meant that the businesses in Lincoln and throughout the state would have to either do away with gaming or go with the state-approved machines.

However, before the program even got off the ground, the state was plagued with delays due to questions on the contracts they had signed with game manufacturers and marketers, as well as glitches in the new centralized computer system for the games.

The state has continued to struggle through these issues and is still determined that the new machines will be the only option in the future for establishments such as Logan Lanes.

In the two years that this has been going on, the city has not had to make a decision, but they have taken the time to hear from the public, and at last count, the public in general was against legalized gambling in the city of Lincoln.

In October of 2010, Anita Bedell, the executive director of Illinois Church Action on Alcohol & Addiction Problems, out of Springfield, addressed the council on the issue. She said the games would lead to addiction and the deterioration of family values.

At the same meeting, Snyder said he'd received letters from Pastor Dustin Fulton of the Jefferson Street Church as well as Rebecca Van Nydeggen of the Salvation Army speaking out against legalized gambling.

In January of 2011, Van Nydeggen made a personal appearance in council chambers and presented a number of statistics showing the harm gambling can cause, not just in families but also in the community at large.

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The city then decided to have a public hearing on the topic. The hearing was set for Feb. 22, 2011.

That evening the council chamber was full and bursting with people who were there to state their cases either for or against the issue.

Those speaking out against gambling included Bedell; Larry Crawford and Mike Robbins of Open Arms Christian Fellowship; Fulton; Amy Wubben, who worked with children who had been taken from families with addiction problems associated with lottery tickets; and Ed Carter, who spoke as a concerned citizen.

Dick Anderson of Lincoln American Legion Post 263, Irv Gesner of the Glass House Tavern, Shawn Taylor of Logan Lanes and Joe Papesch of Old Joe's spoke in favor of the gaming.

Larry Hartley of Hartley Amusements in Normal also attended, saying video gaming could fund capital projects in the city of Lincoln.

Dale Ridgeway of Lincoln spoke of his addiction and the loss of $60,000 as a result, and Elaine Woolard of Lincoln talked about growing up with a father addicted to gambling.

At the end of that evening, the unofficial poll of opinion seemed to indicate that the majority was against allowing video gambling in the city of Lincoln.

With that meeting behind them and with the struggles of the state to get the program off the ground, city council members had reached a point that they were not under pressure to make a decision on the issue.

Then, with the discovery that the ordinances needed to prohibit gambling are already in place for the city, it appeared this could have been a dead issue.

However, Tuesday evening Neitzel said she felt it was something the city was going to have to vote on.

Alderwoman Melody Anderson noted that before a vote could be taken, there would have to be a motion for a new ordinance. She said she felt the topic should be turned over to the ordinance committee for them to discuss and deliver a recommendation.

Alderman Tom O'Donohue, who chairs that committee, was not present Tuesday night, but Alderman Jeff Hoinacki, who is also on the committee, said he would get in touch with O'Donohue and they would decide what their next step should be.

[By NILA SMITH]

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