Legislative Updates Winter 2000-01

Tallahassee: The Flagler, Hollywood, and Pensacola greyhound tracks have formed a political action committee (PAC), Floridians for a Level Playing Field, designed to place a constitutional amendment on the 2002 ballot to legalize slot machines at pari-mutuel facilities. The group had raised $266,000 by the end of October and had hired research firms in Washington, D.C. and San Diego to guage public interest in expanded gambling.
The group also has filed a ballot initiative petition with the Florida Secretary of State to place the issue before voters, county by county, in the November 2002 election. Although the initiative is in its early stages, the PAC has begun collecting signatures of registered voters. Larry Laws, 43, of Largo, told the St. Petersburg Times that he was being paid 75 cents per signature to get people’s names on petitition forms.
A total of 43,536 signatures are required before the initiative is sent to the Florida Attorney General’s Office and Supreme Court for review and approval. If approved, ten times that many signatures, 435,529, would be required to place the question on the 2002 ballot.
George Greene III of St. Petersburg, current board member and former executive director of No Casinos Inc., said the ballot question is similar to the ones voters rejected three times before, and his group will oppose this one too. “The voters have spoken pretty loudly in the past about the idea of casino gambling,” Greene said. Ballot initiatives to legalize casino gambling were first defeated in1978, again in 1986 by 68 percent of the voters, and last in 1994 when 62 percent of the voters rejected expanded gambling.
Daniel K. Adkins, president and chairman of the PAC, argues that the new ballot question is different from the 1994 casino referendum, which would have allowed full-scale casino gambling. “Unlike other propositions that have failed, this one is truly limited,” Adkins said. “It is strictly at existing pari-mutuel facilities.”
Gov. Jeb Bush is opposed to expanded gambling in the state. In 2000, Bush and his Cabinet signed a resolution stating they would “hereby express their opposition to the expansion of gambling in the state of Florida and the legalization of any form of casino gambling.”
More Tax Cuts Likely in 2001
Meanwhile, with the next election nearly two years away, legislative supporters of the dog and horse tracks and the frontons are reportedly working on a plan to further reduce taxes by an additional $10 million in the next legislative session which begins in January 2001. In the final hours of the 2000 session, the Legislature approved a $20 million tax cut for the pari-mutuel industry, the bulk of which went to bail out the dog racing industry. The bill became law without the governor’s signature.
Details of the current proposal are still being finalized, but the state would collect only enough taxes from the venues to cover the cost of regulation. “We are at a cross-roads with pari-mutuels,” said Sen. Jim King, R-Jacksonville. “We’re either going to have to do things to help their existence or we’re just going to have to accept the fact that it’s a slow decline to oblivion,” King said.
In addition to another tax break, track owners want deregulation for the tracks and a ban on casino boats, which operate offshore in international waters.
State taxes collected from all the pari-mutuels peaked at $130 million during the 1987-88 fiscal year. Paul Kirsch, director of the Division of Pari-Mutuel Wagering, said the state expects to collect $30 million to $35 million in pari-mutuel taxes in the current fiscal year. Regulatory costs are expected to total $18 million.
While some key lawmakers favor cutting gambling taxes, the latest plan could touch off a renewed fight during the 2001 legislative session. “No one need think that the pari-mutuel issues are ever, ever going to go away,” King said. King was among the chief engineers of the $20 million tax break in 2000.

Sources: Florida Times-Union: Jim Saunders