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5/5/2009: Dear Paul Pellizzari and the OLG - it’s more than passing strange
OLG Response to Gambling Watch Global
Re: “open letter” to OLG
Your letter of April 2, 2009 raises a number of concerns about problem gambling. I welcome the opportunity to respond to each issue you raise, and describe how OLG continuously seeks to expand its action plan to mitigate harm and risk associated with problem gambling. - Paul Pellizzari
“It is well documented that 40% of OLG gambling income comes from losses of 5% of gamblers and that just 20% of Ontarians provide 80% of the losses which the OLG call profit.” - Bill Clark
That information I gave above comes from a University of Lethbridge study released in June 2004: The Demographic Sources of Ontario Gaming Revenue. (Prepared for The Ontario Problem Gambling Research Centre) The cost of this study was approximately 200 thousand dollars.
• We are aware of the study, authored by Williams and Wood 2004, which found that “about 35% of Ontario gaming revenue is derived from moderate and severe problem gamblers.”
The researchers qualify this finding as “tentative” because the sample size was small (i.e. 32 individuals), and therefore not representative of the general population. If you are aware of other studies, we would be interested in learning of these. -Paul Pellizzari
On November 17 1997, Time magazine published a simple graph in an article titled: Where Gambling Dollars Come From. Gambling profits depend on the losses of gambling addicts.
In terms of other studies may I direct your attention to letters written to the OLGC in your own files, prior to your Picov input study. And the 1999 Wynne study: Problem Gambling Public Awareness Campaigns in North America.
It seems to those of us, Ontarians concerned for the public health of our fellow citizens, that it is more than passing strange that even government agencies involved in gambling seem generally unaware of the existence of this report. Should we therefore be surprised that most of our “public” appears to be totally unaware of the dangers that gambling poses to an unaware and uninformed populace?
The OLGC’s attention was drawn to Managerial and Decision Economics, John Wiley & Sons May 2001. This issue was devoted to social and economic analysis of gambling. In this volume there is an article by two Canadian economists as well as other recognized professionals.
Canada has yet to produce a cost/benefit study, but other countries whose governments are not direct connected to promoting gambling revenue are more critical. Cost/benefit studies have been done in Australia, New Zealand, UK and the US.
What about the US National Gambling Impact Study (June 1999) where a great deal of sworn testimony was given to US Congress and data came directly from the American Gambling Association.
As a retired pharmacist, I am aware of drug companies which write their own product monographs without peer review. These product monographs are not acceptable for the AMA (American Medical Association), CMA (Canadian Medical Association), CAMH (Canadian Association of Mental Health), or Lancet.
The amount spent by the four Ontario casinos for marketing & promotion is reported to be greater than 500,000,000 dollars per year. This amount is over and above money allocated for regular OLG advertising (Toronto Star). When the OLG confirms that a 100 plus thousand dollars is spent marketing to one addict alone, (Hamilton Spectator) this expenditure goes beyond enticement and beyond basic decency.
• OLG relies on research from credible sources and seeks guidance through formal relationships with expert groups – including CAMH, Ontario Problem Gambling Research Centre, and the Responsible Gambling Council – on how best to apply the best available data to the development of RG policies and programs. - Paul Pellizzari
I have addressed that above. These are sources used by promoters, and all are paid for by gambling money. Balanced harm and cost reports are not included. I would suggest peer review. Can you tell me if any of these studies are reviewed by anyone other than promoters?
“$2 billion of advertising and promotion by the OLG in the last 10 years.”
• OLG advertising complies with provincial regulations under the Gaming Control Act. We have also gone further by developing strict internal ad and marketing guidelines.
• As part of the entertainment business, we advertise and promote our products. A large part of our marketing budget is spent by resort casinos competing for business with gaming facilities across the Canada-US border. - Paul Pellizzari
This amount is reported to be greater than 500,000,000 dollars per year and is over and above regular OLG advertising. See Andrew Chung, The Toronto Star; Who Should Pay (2004) and Casinos not taking chances in court (2009).
• All individuals who register for self-exclusion cease to receive distributions of all gaming advertising, promotions and complementaries. - Paul Pellizzari
Point #1. The OLG made the rules.
Point #3. Individuals may well cease to receive direct mailings and promotions, but are still subject to all the daily output of OLG advertising placed in newspapers, on TV, and all other visual stimuli. To a half million addicted people, this continuous input to the addictive mind is harmful.
The background article to CBC’s Playing the Machines looks at the fact that suicide related deaths are not nationally tracked and the Ontario gambling suicides are increasing. (Dave Seglins, Ontario gambling-linked suicides rise.)
The background article to CTV W5’s Winners and Losers looks at the failure in enforcement of the self-exclusion policy.
The OLG continues in denial. Take a look at the comments under the CBC article, or at any recent article on self-exclusion which permits comments. The public is waking up to lack of care.
There was a blanket denial from the OLG that lottery sales vendors could cheat winners at the distribution level for years. There is now a new self verification ticket machine in Ontario.
Perhaps Bob Edmonds didn’t die in vain. In his case the legal fees to fight him in court were greater than the prize he claimed. As the Canadian public well knows, the OLG apology to Edmonds did not arrive in his lifetime.
Now a new pollutant enters the public sphere.
I must congratulate OLG for turning a harmful criticism around (the Edmonds case) and into an wow marketing tool, a by-product of lotto ticket savvy and education. I’m talking about that stupid catchy funky voice that confirms every lottery ticket stuck in to a scanner, plays that lotto tune and announces “winner/ gagnant” . One finds one’s-self looking at the player the tune is directed at and wondering what the great prize may be.
It is hard to find a business where OLG does not pursue us. This is a new level of intrusion.
• OLG has also launched a major myth-busting campaign and launched educational tools such as the website KnowYourLimit.ca, and a video co-developed with the Ontario Problem Gambling Research Centre.
“$39M dollars spent this year on prevention and research…isn’t a lot” - Paul Pellizzari
Relative to the annual sum of player losses per year - approximately 1 cent per dollar is spent by the OLG for prevention and research. Most of this prevention money goes in new, unnecessary and yet more industry favourable and repetitive in-house research. 39 million dollars yearly for research and prevention out of the annual 6 billion OLG intake is not very much.
• Ontario’s problem gambling strategy is one of the best funded programs in North America, and likely the world. In 2009-10 this funding will increase to $40 million. Since fiscal year 1999-2000, approximately $322 million has been allocated to the Province, which includes an estimated $40 million allocation for Fiscal 2009-10.
• The amount allocated to the strategy is set by policy of the government of Ontario. The Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care and the Ministry of Health Promotion distribute these funds to independent researchers, addictions counselors and outreach experts. - Paul Pellizzari
It would be interesting to see the amount spent on treatment over the years compared to continual repeated research. Most of the people I speak to go to Gamblers Anonymous for treatment and find it hard. They are reluctant to talk and ashamed of themselves.
This repeated research remains self defeating because research already done is not being applied. We have read articles of Public Health employees who have been muted, or muzzled about speaking out on gambling problems. Nowhere do we hear people should cease gambling, we hear about responsible gambling.
Funding policies also mute public debate on social costs of gambling says critics (.pdf) Sue Bailey and Louise Elliott Canadian Press February 27, 2003, is an interesting article with good background.
Have you read Dr. Peter McKenna (Terminal Damage) or a recent editorial in the Thunder Bay Chronicle talk about the impossibility of getting anyone to talk about gambling damage publicly?
I agree that Ontario has a well funded program comparative to the rest of North America. The question remains. How effective is that programs voice against a billion promotion dollars?
“OLG winner’s cards over the years have been used exclusively to reward addiction” - Bill Clark
The difficulty is that so much money is dependant on so few people, that one has to be very careful. Fully one third of OLG money comes from 5% of gamblers. Is the responsible gambling program promoted because OLG cannot afford to lose that segment of addicted support ?
A 2001 Picov study seemed to indicate that only 36% of Ontarians used OLG facilities and yes, it also mentions suicides.
• Player’s cards are optional. - Paul Pellizzari
However, the addicted mind cannot make a correct choice.
The addict wants his share of player rewards credited to his account.
He or she is going to plug in his card and connect just like pictures show - happy smiling addicts, all connected to the slots.
What about making player cards compulsory? Every one must use them. Have a policy such as Holland does; at first signs of self abuse, the player card privilege is cancelled.
That means no playing anywhere in Ontario.
OLG winner cards follow players in order to reward loss.
Holland analyses the same player information and determines rate of loss, but sets a point where gambling employees recognize reckless and addictive playing. The player is then flagged and is called into a casino office. There they are questioned on their ability to lose the amount they are playing and this is done to prevent active self abuse and criminal acts.
In Ontario OLG patrons do not have to sign up nor do they have to use the cards if they have one.
• When people indicate that they want to self-exclude to take a break from gambling their loyalty cards are rendered inactive. - Paul Pellizzari
That may be so, but by this time the harm is done, and if they must gamble, and they must, they are still admitted and OLG continues to cash in.
Rather than waiting until it is too late for the player, let the OLG take the initiative.
Program OLG computers to recognize addictive behaviors and assess the individual before it is too late. Look at behaviour and compare rates of loss to annual income averages. The OLG is perfectly equipped to cross reference information such as Switzerland does. (See the letter to former Ontario Health Minister George Smitherman from Dr. Paul Garfinkel, November 2004).
In April this year, 3 female players who reported having lost hundreds of thousands of dollars were recognized and rewarded for their addiction by the OLG.
A Quebec addict admitted he had a problem and went beyond signing a self-exclusion contract. He contacted the local casino by letter and phone asking the contract be honoured. I realize this occurred is Quebec, however his story demonstrates a point.
When I enquired of an OLG lottery agent about over selling tickets to an addict, she advised me in no uncertain terms that she was there to sell tickets.
When OLG and a self aware addict sign a self exclusion contact there is no stronger plea for help from an addict.
This act of self admission is not supported by the OLG. The OLG has defaulted on it’s contractual obligations.
“No drug has a higher suicide record than pathological gambling.”- Bill Clark
• We are not aware of any study that ranks the type of addiction as a determinant of suicide. Nevertheless, any death linked to gambling is of concern. For this reason, OLG has put in place various initiatives to help refer people to the professional guidance they need (see details below). - Paul Pellizzari
I find the above OLG statement very hard to accept. It has been awhile that I left pharmacy and I do not recall any drug with the continuous mention of suicide that is associated with pathological gambling. VLTs linked to “crack cocaine” VLTs and slots are interchanageable.
Before you have suicidal ideas call this number
Quebec slots come with warnings “avant les idees suicidaires”
The Canada Safety Council has written the Prime Minister, premiers and provincial coroners about gambling suicide.
Nearly all peer reviewed studies link this complex and tragic side effect. Suicide is a side effect. Children of gamblers are far more like to commit suicide. See Canadian Roulette at the Canada Safety Council website.
All this makes me want to ask; where have you been?
Where are you now? Are you going anywhere with all this?
I would invite you to read Manitoba Gambling and Problem Gambling 2006. (.pdf) There is a section on suicide.
I also invite you to look at studies about Las Vegas and Atlantic City and their contracts with addicts, or Quebec coroner reports.
Regarding the use of the term, “gaming”, I appreciate that it may be a word more commonly used within the industry, OLG is less focused on such semantics and is working to continuously improve its role in the task at hand - which is to reduce harm associated with problem gambling.
In addition to addressing your specific issues, I’d like to provide an overview of our multi-pronged responsible gambling program:
• Prevention and Support through the creation of 24 on-site Responsible Gaming Resource Centers so far, run by renowned prevention experts, the Responsible Gambling Council. All gaming sites will have these centres by next year.
• The RGRCs serve as a bridge for referrals to professional help and community care
• Specialized training for all OLG staff, in particular our 6,000+ gaming employees using a curriculum designed by national addiction experts from CAMH.
• Contribution and support for research in problem gambling.
• Targeted education for players and the public about the realities of gambling through myth-busting and other materials, supported by the Know Your Limit campaign and website.
• Surveillance employees in all gaming facilities work with floor staff and security on all OLG Responsible Gaming programs.
• OLG slot machines issue a system alert to flag a self-excluded person who attempts to use a loyalty card for slot play.
• Pilot testing new technology in facial recognition designed for detection of self-excluded individuals. - Paul Pellizzari
How can anyone believe you (OLG) have any interest in citizens and their humanity until you stop aggressive saturation Pavlovian marketing?
If you want to train a laboratory rat to push a button, don’t reward him with a food pellet after every push - vary the number of pushes required for the payoff. Give him a pellet after 4 pushes one time, 16 the next, then 3, then 23.
By manipulating the length between payoffs researchers can led a rat, pigeon or human into addictive behaviors.
They could stretch the ratio to the point where the rat would literally drop over from exhaustion (Burt Constable, Pigeon, Rat or Human, Gambling Is Addictive. Daily Herald May 6, 2000)
How can the OLG be believed when your contractual obligations regarding self exclusion contracts are not enforced? It is known there are nearly 1/2 million problem gamblers in Ontario and that about 12 thousand have self-exclusion contracts. You acknowledged this in The Globe and Mail’s recent piece, The Big Bluff.
What is the point of these contracts if they aren’t enforced?
Again, thank you for your interest in our responsible gambling programs. For more information, please see KnowYourLimit.ca. - Paul Pellizzari
No addict knows their limit, no addict respects their limit, and no addict chooses to be an addict.
Is the OLG responsibly respecting self-exclusion contracts instead of blaming people who admit they need help?
There has to be better awareness by the OLG that gambling is addictive.
Finally.
After 10 years of advocacy we have a remark and response from OLG.
Thank you for commenting.
No reader comments yet - add yours See related articles: Activism, Canada, Wisdom and its absence 
Bill Clark4/2/2009: Ombudsman: recommend banning retailers - OLG clean up your act
Ontario’s Ombudsman says he’ll recommend the legislature ban retailers from playing the lottery if the Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corporation can’t clean up widespread fraud.
Andre Marin, whose 2007 report found a disproportionate number of retailers winning the lottery, said he has resisted calling for a ban in order to give retailers “an opportunity to be honest and give the OLG a chance to police them.
“But if there is going to be a whole industry to police, we should just ban them. It’s such a headache. They are a wily lot.”
Administrator4/2/2009: Open letter to OLG CEO Kelly McDougald
It seems to me some time ago I read that OLG could not even cheat honestly.
In reading over your remarks about CTV’s investigative program W5, again I find myself disturbed by your language.
B. F. Skinner remarked over 50 years ago that we are not born addicts. We become addicted when exposed to a series of events and intermittent rewards. And from those intermittent rewards; pigeon, rat or human will become addicted.
I have experienced almost 50 years of community pharmacy, and in that time dispensed a lot of dugs; including a wide variety of controlled drugs, narcotics and other addictive drugs.
When CAMH head Mr. Garfinkel wrote Ontario Minister of Health George Smitherman of his growing concerns that of almost 500,000 addicted gamblers and Ontario casinos, there was no mention of an answer, or indeed, a response to his concern.
No pharmaceutical company could get away with those numbers.
In terms of language the continual use the word ‘gaming’ is a cheat in itself.
Gaming produces problems gamers - but the OLG uses the term problem gambler.
Your use of Responsible Gambling Council uses gambling.
Gaming is to gambling as light cigarettes are to tobacco…it still causes cancer.
Gaming did take in 6 billion dollars, 6 thousand million dollars in Ontario.
That might be 500 dollars from every man, woman and child in Ontario.
That might be the total average income of maybe $ 30,000 from 200,000 Ontarians.
What a lot of Windsor cars that amount could buy, just think about those losses converted into sales at a community level.
It is well documented that 40% of OLG gambling income comes from losses of 5% of gamblers and that just 20% of Ontarians provide 80% of the losses which the OLG call profit.
Let’s address myth busting and this program to avert losses from baby boomers, who have been buried in 2 billion dollars of advertising and promotion by the OLG the last 10 years.
Somehow there was no mention of that large amount of $39 million dollars spent this year on prevention and research.
A lot of money, but compared to 200 million+ per year for
advertising; 39 million as a percentage of 6 thousand million of profit isn’t a lot.
OLG winners card over the years have been used exclusively to reward addiction. Your new tech facial recognition has paid for itself is spotting card counters and cheats in your facilities.
OLG products are addictive and no drug has a higher suicide record than pathological gambling. Gambling related suicide has yet to be addressed.
OLG is turning tax paying citizens into service needy gambling addicts.
You do have a serious addiction problem.
Further: Ontario MP Bob Runciman
CTV’s W5 Winners and Losers March 28th, 2009 -video
CTV’s W5 Winners and Losers - about
OLG’s CEO response to Winners & Losers
Update: The original letter from the OLG has been removed because of possible legal ramifications, we regret we may have put anyone in jeopardy.
3/21/2009: A scandal a week
- misprinted scratch-and-win tickets that led a man to believe he had won $135,000 when he hadn’t
- lottery retailers, employees and their families have won $198 million in questionable prizes over the past 13 years
- A malfunctioning slot machine erroneously informs a player he has won $42.9 million when the maximum payout is $9,025
- A Good Samaritan treated shabbily when he tries to turn in a cache of lost tickets
- Mercedes-Benzes awarded as casino prizes at a time the government is bailing out North American automakers
OLG CEO Kelly McDougald was hired in 2007 to clean up the public agency. Ms. McDougald makes four hundred thousand dollars a year to make excuses.
3/10/2009: Canada’s Gambling Watch Network’s Newsletter
Volume 10 Issue 028 CWE March 9 2009
Youth
‘Children rated as impulsive by their kindergarten teachers appear more likely to begin gambling behaviors like playing cards or placing bets before they hit middle school, Canadian researchers said’ is a sentence in 3/2/09 study in the Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine. It is the first to show gambling among children this young, said Linda Pagani, who led the study at Sainte-Justine University Hospital Research Center and the Universite de Montreal. (canada.com - admin)
Horse racing
Magna Entertainment shares to be delisted from TSX on April 1 is a headline in The 3/3/09 Toronto Star. The reason given is ‘failing to meet the Toronto Stock Exchange’s listing requirements’
On 2/3/09 Bill Clark sent a letter to the Belleville Intelligencer to set the record straight of what that paper has written lately concerning Belleville’s Racetrack’s plan.
Raceway security guards OK strike for Thursday reports the a 2/3/09 Windsor Star reports:
Security guards at Windsor Raceway are set to go on strike at 12:01 a.m. Thursday unless a labour contract impasse can be resolved, union officials said Sunday.
Horseracing pensions cut in half, says The 3/3/09 Montreal Gazette. The umbrella association representing Quebec racehorse trainers and drivers is in such grim shape it’s had to make the painful decision to slash by 50 per cent the annual pension payouts to 213 retirees, who now receive a maximum of $750 a month.
Bad Accident Last Night At Woodbine Harness reports the 3/3/09 Canadian Gambling. It wasn’t as bad as it looked. No horses were put down. The piece ends with a question: why didn’t a third horse get a chance at the $55,400 purse?
Province reconsiders whopping veterinary fee increase, reports The 3/3/09 Telegraph-Journal. New Brunswick horse owners have kicked up a stink over a fee increase that would add almost 200 per cent to clinical veterinary care for horses and livestock.
Cindy McCloskey, owner and operator of Sterling Creek Stables in Noonan, said the fee increase would have a devastating impact on horse owners, breeders and the racing industry, which already is in serious financial difficulty.
Pickets march at track is the heading of an item in The 3/6/09 Windsor Star reporting that 16 security guards, who voted unanimously to strike, will walk the line from 8 a.m. to about midnight at the racetrack’s two entrances.
Magna racing unit pulls up lame, reports the 3/6 Toronto Star.
Stronach’s race spin-off carries nearly $1B (U.S.) in debt and files for bankruptcy protection in U.S. court. After a 10-year ride that was about as smooth as a trip on the back of a bucking bronco, Frank Stronach’s dreams of rekindling North America’s pre-World War II fascination with horse racing have fallen off the track.
Weekend big one for P E I horse owners, says The 3/6/09 Guardian. A Saturday night awards banquet in Cornwall will honour the top performers of the 2008 harness racing season of the Standardbred Horse Owners Association
$lots City will be a winner if/when they arrive reports The 3/7/09 Belleville Intelligencer.
The city of Belleville, without ever placing a bet, could be a big winner when — and if — the new Quinte Exhibition and Raceway is developed by Baymount.
Sports
Bets are off in Windsor for Final Four, says The 2/23/09 Detroit Free Press.
The NCAA has persuaded the Ontario government to suspend basketball betting at Caesars Windsor while Detroit hosts the NCAA’s marquee event, the 2009 Final Four, in early April.
Lottery
Final Super 7 draw on Sept 18, says The 3/4/09 Toronto Star. After 15 years the Interprovincial Lottery Corp. will replace the national Friday night draw with a new game The corp. administers the Super 7, details of the new lottery will be announced in the coming months, the company said.
Crime
Fraud could increase, warns the 3/3/09 Regina Leader-Post at the launch of Fraud Awareness Month, History shows there tends to be growth in fraudulent activity when there’s a downturn in the economy.
Alberta
Casinos lay off staff as revenues fall off says The 3/3/09 Edmonton Journal. The Alberta government predicts millions in gaming revenues will vanish from its budget as recession-weary gamblers stay home, but the Journal’s Al Wilson is betting business will pick up sooner than later and he calls the job cuts over the past three weeks at the Palace and Baccarat casinos ‘temporary layoffs’ instead of ‘permanent losses’.
Battling addictive behaviour, a 3 page feature in The 3/5/09 Calgary Herald, tells stories of the Calgary Dream Centre where addicts get help from others. We’re told that sponsorship and group meetings are the most effective ways to thwart setbacks in addict treatments.
More than $100,000 up for grabs as Sun Bingo returns reports the gambling loving and practicing Edmonton Sun.
Saskatoon
Couple to set up recovery homes for addicts says The 3/7/09 Regina Leader-Post. The homes only deal with a drug and alcohol treatment program.
Ontario
Courier finds bag of lottery tickets, reports The 1/3/09 Toronto Star. A courier was driving his usual Rexdale route last Wednesday at 10 a.m. when he came upon a ripped plastic bag on the side of Humber College Blvd., near Highway 27, full of brand new lottery tickets worth $3,400. The driver says that gaming officials showed a surprising lack of concern. A day later the courier gets an OLG apology.
Look at risks gamblers advised, says The 3/2/09 Chronicle Journal. Members of the Responsible Gaming Council checked people aged 55 and older at the Thunder Bay Charity Casino over the weekend.
Addiction services are available announces The 3/4/09 Sarnia Observer. The coordinator of the Westover Treatment Centre in Thamesville said he knows it could be helping more Sarnia-Lambton residents.
The centre’s 1-800-721-3232 addiction assistance service line can connect people to qualified addiction counselors, 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Those counselors can refer callers to self-help groups in their area, as well as community services.
The 3/4/09 Niagara Falls Review:
The wage freeze Niagara Casinos imposed last year has thawed now that the company has announced a 35 cent an hour raise for all employees at Niagara Fallsview Casino Resort and Casino Niagara. Full-time employees will received a $1,400 bonus to be paid out in May, spokesman Greg Medulun said.
Casino to get 375M facelift, reports The 3/4/09 Brantford Expositor. The city casino is expected to create about 200 construction jobs and turn the gaming site into one of the most environmentally friendly casinos in Canada. The work is to start this week. (archived - admin)
Antigambling group targeting boomers at Gan casino today is the heading of an item in The 3/5/09 Gananoque Recorder and Times that warns Canada’s biggest demographic group, the boomers, that their gambling puts their retirement futures in jeopardy. (archived - admin)
Nova Scotia
After all last week’s items on the approved new Keno system a letter to the Editor printed in The 2/27/09 Cape Breton Post was titled: Keno a gimmick to keep bars open
With Keno being allowed in bars, we have yet another indication that there are too many bars or patrons are becoming fewer. It seems this trend has been around for decades, and through the years one gimmick after another (such as go-go dancers, topless waitresses who were not so topless, wet T-shirt contests) was used to lure customers back to empty bars.
The logical course for MLAs would be to allow bar owners to serve booze and have bands for music and dancing but nothing else. Any bar unable to remain would be allowed to go out of business, enabling the remaining ones to make a reasonable income.
The introduction of Keno will only add to the problems of people who are looking for another avenue to pursue something for nothing. Unfortunately, any time one gets something for nothing it turns out to be nothing for something, which cannot in any way contribute to a strong and healthy society.
Vic Foster
Sydney
Groups join to oppose keno is an encouraging piece in The 3/7 Halifax Herald.
Thursday afternoon the Safe Bet Society announced they have joined forces with Game Over VLTS to fight the game. The high-speed electronic gambling game was just introduced in Nova Scotia establishments this week. In total, 180 bars and restaurants have agreements in place with the province to get the game. Players can make $10 wagers on numbered tickets every five minutes with a 10-minute break every hour’ “Keno is a horribly addictive game,” said Ken Hanna, chairman of Safe Bet Society.
“Shame on the Nova Scotia Government for putting a cash grab ahead of the safety and well-being of Nova Scotians.” We gladly put our ‘Amen’ behind these words.
USA
Unemployed place their bets on casino jobs says CNN - 3/6/09.
Colorado will allow higher bets, expanded hours at state’s casinos’. Here is one example: ‘Jerry Goldsmith was one of hundreds of people who turned out this week to apply for a casino job. The Colorado man lost his engineering job of 29 years — and the six-figure salary that went with it — and is now applying for a casino job dealing craps, blackjack, roulette and poker.
Don’t you find that hard to believe?
International
France Prepares to Welcome Online Casino Gambling, reports the 3/5/09 Online Casino Advisory.
The new online gambling law would bring France into compliance with European Union agreements on trade in services and allow Internet casinos to apply for licensing.
UK Gambling bigger threat to sport than doping says The 3/5/09 Independent.
Professional sportsmen and women face having to register every bet they make under stringent reforms intended to root out corrupt gambling. In the past 17 months, the industry watchdog the Gambling Commission has investigated 47 cases of alleged match-fixing and illegal betting on British sporting events.
The governing bodies of all sports have plans for tough new regulations which they hope will stamp out what they consider to be ‘as great a risk to the integrity of sport as doping.
No reader comments yet - add yours See related articles: Activism, Canada, Gambling Watch Canada Network Newsletter 
J. Deviet3/2/2009: Letter to the Belleville Intelligencer
Re: Setting the record straight on racetrack and slots by Kelly McDougald Chief Executive Officer Ontario Lottery and Gaming
Interesting numbers from OLG. Lets see if I understand.
Ontario horses get 20 %, so far some 2.7 billion dollars. Municipalities get 5 %, so far some .48 billion dollars.
Gamblers lost 100 % to the tune of 12.72 billion dollars.
So humans get a nickel, horses get 20 cents, OLG gets the rest.
But, there is no mention of pari-mutual betting, no mention of lottery, no mention of Nevada tickets, bingo dollars etc…
Does anyone one know how much gambling money is leaving your community?
Doesn’t anyone think community money should go into community business first, so spin-off effects will benefit the community first?
We read that OLG benefits with 6 billion dollars of Ontario citizens losses. Put another way, this means that an average wage of about $30,000 earned by 200,000 Ontarians is lost to Ontario business.
Wow. 6 billion dollars. Six thousand million dollars could be $1,000.00 from 6 million people.
Alas, we are told 5 % of the population blow 35 % of the losses, the next 15 % blow 45 %, 80 % only contribute 20 % of the losses.
So, in those years some 430,000 (2004 report) Ontario citizens have become gambling addicts. Ontario refuses to track gambling suicides, the Canada Safety Council estimated 200 per year. (2004)
We read of dollars gambled by white collar workers in positions of trust. We read of courts being backed up by too many gambling cases. We read of gambling fraud, and jailed gamblers, even read that 32,000 are in jail for gambling fraud in California, which is a state with about the same population as Canada.
OLG has about 20 court challenges so far, half settled out of court, and subject to non disclosure. You can bet they will all be settled quietly, with non disclosure. After all what does a crown corporation charged with raising money for public health have to explain to Ontario citizens?
Set the record straight ?
There is something sad about government success which depends on addiction and losses of its citizens.
No reader comments yet - add yours See related articles: Activism, Canada, Wisdom and its absence
Bill Clark2/24/2009: Canada’s Gambling Watch Network’s Newsletter
Volume 10 Issue 026 CWE February 23 2009
Horse racing
Lyle Lovett, a four times Grammy Award winner with 13 guitar albums is using an article in the 2/19/09 Standardbred Canada to support getting slot machines at horse racing tracks.
City playing the ponies? asks The 2/19/09 Belleville Intelligencer on the possibility that the city could take the reins to see harness racing return to Quinte should the current developer fail to proceed with a proposed slots parlour and racetrack.
Maritime triple-crown champion going to the United States says The 2/20/09 Guardian. O’Brien Award winning horseman Phil Pinkney admits that he has sold Deep Finesse, the Maritime two-year-old champion, to owners at Dover Downs. The colt was scheduled to leave today.
In the same issue of this paper an item is headed Former Harness Racing P.E.I. accountant up for fraud. Gordon Crozier of Cornwall appeared on Thursday before Chief Provincial Court Judge John Douglas. He faces charges of theft over $5,000, fraud exceeding $5,000 and uttering forged documents and is expected to elect his mode of trial when the case returns to court next month. The offences are alleged to have occurred between July 1, 2005, and September 30, 2008.
Lotteries
Big dreams lure buyers to mammoth 6 49 draw is one of the many 2/20/09 newspaper items - this one in The Victoria Times Colonist – that announce the $48M 6/49 Jackpot.
Gambling
Casinos get iPhone software alert, warns an AP piece in The 2/17/09 Toronto Star. Card counting by players is not illegal in Nevada but that using a device to count cards is considered a felony.
Million dollar slot machine winner loses in court, at WLOX 2/18/09 Biloxi, MS. A Mississippi woman who totally believed she’d won $1M on a slot machine had her case settle by court for $8,000 after three years. The casino claimed the machine was programmed by mistake as a progressive slot, meaning the actual top jackpot was just the $8,000 she finally received.
Gambling Becoming Major Income for Charities, reports the 2/20/09 Online Casino Sphere. Casino gambling continues to expand across the US as governments eye gaming revenue as an alternative to higher taxes.
Crime
Debt finally topples a Las Vegas high roller, says The 2/15/09 Los Angeles Times. Casinos vied with each other to lure a high-stakes Bay Area gambler to their tables. They flew him to Las Vegas on private jets, put him up for free in opulent suites, extended him millions of dollars in credit on his signature alone, etc. He was good for business. Siddiqui, who made $225,000 a year as a top Fry’s Electronics executive, once lost $8 million in a day! It was not Siddiqui’s only debt or even his largest. Court records indicate that the 43-year-old businessman gambled away as much as $167 million over the last decade. Yet even as he amassed huge IOUs, casinos around the country continued to lend him millions more.
Two Year Gambling Investigation Leads To Sixty-Six Arrests In Ohio says CasinoGamblingWeb on 2/16/09. It reveals that US authorities are spending increasingly large amounts to investigate illegal gambling operations. The Ohio investigation lasted 2 years and cost thousands of taxpayer dollars. The defendants now face felony charges of grand theft, money laundering, and gambling.
There has been an outrage in certain communities where crime is high and murderers are walking the streets, yet the authorities are choosing to spend their resources taking down illegal gambling operations,’ said observer Barry Greenberg.
Finance
Trump Entertainment, Affiliates File for Bankruptcy’, says the 2/17/09 Bloomberg.
The casino company founded by Donald Trump, filed for bankruptcy after annual gambling revenue in Atlantic City, New Jersey, plunged the most on record.
Three Trump casinos seek 3rd bankruptcy 2/18/09 Toronto Star.
The three Atlantic City casinos once run by Donald Trump filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection yesterday – for the third time.
Hard-hit Texas port city eyes casinos to stay afloat says The 2/19/09 Calgary Herald. Galveston, ravaged by hurricane Ike and the tidal wave caused by the U.S.A.’s economic collapse, will legalize gambling and open casinos to lure tourists.
Saskatchewan
This Saturday the Regina Leader Post has four items dealing with the province’s newest The Living Sky Casino. The one headed Benefits of new casino are economic, emotional says;
The Living Sky Casino will provide substantial benefits for the First Nations of the File Hills Qu’Appelle Tribal Council (FHQTC). (While the financial boom provided by employment opportunities and direct payments is obvious,) there are also less tangible benefits. FHQTC Tribal Chair Edmund Bellegarde said that one of the primary benefits is the self-respect that has been realized by First Nations people through this outstanding facility.
The article headed Collaboration key in Living Sky Casino project states:
In many ways, Swift Current was the perfect location for a new casino. It represented a large, untapped trading area with over a million cars passing through the city each year. The main factors in getting the necessary support for this new attraction were the obvious tourism benefits, in addition to providing a new convention and banquet space, a performing arts theatre and a casino.
Number three is headed: Saskatchewan’s newest entertainment destination
The much-anticipated grand opening of the Living Sky Casino became a reality on December 28, 2008. This first-class venue, located in Swift Current, is southwest Saskatchewan’s newest entertainment attraction. Swift Current Mayor Sandy Larson is pleased that the much anticipated $35 million entertainment facility has finally become a reality.
And Living Sky Casino From the ground up writes:
The thematic design features American native motifs, colours, and textures. Sculptural art is introduced in the interior and exterior. Exterior theming elements include firebowls with sculpted flames, pilasters and glass fibre reinforced concrete art panels. A 600-seat theater with retractable seating, stage, and fly tower is part of the design and converts to a multi-purpose banquet room and separate meeting rooms.
Ontario
Police raid cockfighting ring, writes The 2/19/09 Windsor Star.
The Ontario Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals received an anonymous tip and contacted police Saturday. Officers arrived at a brown metal barn on a hill, surrounded by farm fields on Highway 48, near Newmarket, north of Toronto. When they opened the doors, they saw people crowded around two roosters fighting in a pit’. The result: 70 people were charged with causing unnecessary suffering and being found in a common betting house.
500 seat bingo hall to open Saturday, reports the 2/20/09 Brantford Expositor. Games will begin at Six Nations’ new $9.5M bingo hall on Saturday.
The new building is about triple the size of the old hall, which was in serious disrepair. The project is funded by Six Nations band council, which expects to recoup its investment, said economic development officer Darryl Hill.
Quebec
The 2/18/09 CNW Telbec reports that a new slot machine developed by Ingenio has arrived in Québec casinos. We quote:
This is the Québec launch of the first in a series of slot machines to be developed within the framework of a strategic alliance forged by Ingenio and Bally Technologies in June 2006, to the benefit of the Société des casinos,” said Ingenio’s Director General, Nathalie Rajotte. Other games are currently in or soon to be entering the certification phase, which is overseen by the province’s alcohol and gaming board, the Régie des alcools, des courses et des jeux du Québec.
In other words: we can expect more of these satanic highly addictive machines.
Beyond our border
Sources Say Dice Game May Have Sparked Shooting, says the 2/20/09 ClickOnDetroit.com, Four investigators have learned that gambling may have led to a shooting Tuesday inside Detroit Central High School.
No reader comments yet - add yours See related articles: Activism, Canada, Gambling Watch Canada Network Newsletter
J. Deviet2/17/2009: Canada’s Gambling Watch Network’s Newsletter
Volume 10 Issue 025 CWE February 16 2009
Crime
Casinos ripped off, 2/14/09 AP item in the Edmonton Journal. ‘A man involved in a sophisticated card-cheating ring has pleaded guilty to defrauding casinos in California and Canada of some $1 million by bribing card dealers and using card-counting devices’.
Legal Gambling
‘Trent University sociology professor Dr. Jim Cosgrave recently published a new book exploring the social impacts of gambling entitled Casino State: Legalized Gambling in Canada’ is in an item in The 2/11/09 Northumberlandtoday. The article is so interesting that we want to read the book. We’re looking for it!
Casino State: Legalized Gambling in Canada available at Chapters Indigo
Addiction
Gamblers respond to near misses, says a 2/12/09 Press Association article. ‘Just missing the winning line on a slot machine causes the brain to respond as if it has hit the jackpot, research has shown’.
The dilemma of the casino state reports The 2/14/09 Toronto Star in the sad story of an addict who says:
I feel very fortunate that I was able to step away from gambling when I did because there is monumentally more temptation out there today. It’s probably a lot more difficult today for people to give it up.
…A new book (Casino State: Legalized Gambling in Canada) explores how government got hooked on gambling revenues, and the ethics of using them’.
Sports
Sports betting is no long shot, The 2/9/09 Toronto Star offers an appeal to greed.
Legal sports betting is coming to the eastern U.S. and possibly quickly. It’s time for Canada and specifically Ontario to decide whether it wishes to reap hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue, or simply watch other jurisdictions make the money. This topic tends to peak at the Super Bowl, when billions of dollars are bet, legally or not, on the championship of U.S. pro football.
Horse Racing
Track needs more than horses, reports The 2/7/09 Niagara Falls Review.
There’s still hope the Fort Erie Race Track can survive, but it has to be more than just a means of subsidizing horses running around a track, says Ontario’s minister of energy and infrastructure. It’s an entertainment product that has to have people interested in it to make it successful,” George Smitherman said Friday, while attending an Ontario Liberal party conference this weekend in Niagara Falls.
Summerside Equine Centre an attractive idea reports The 2/7/09 PEI Guardian.
The city of Summerside and Prince County Horsemen’s Club have begun a major undertaking to bring the Maritime horse industry to unprecedented levels. The city, with input from horsemen, has developed the concept of the Summerside Equine Centre, a facility designed to enhance and grow the horse industry on P.E.I. and, particularly, Prince County.
At Woodbine The Monkeys Run The Zoo, warns the 2/8/09 Canadian Gambling News and Issues. It argues takeout levels are perhaps too high and reports that at a recent gaming conference held in Reno, Nevada, Bill Eadington, a prominent gaming authority, stated that racing is in trouble, and that current models are not the way to go. Nick Eaves said ‘I’m not sure there is a problem. I think we’re overstating the problem’. The discussions should be about solutions and realities.
…between 1990 and 1998, pari-mutuel wagering at Woodbine went from $930 million to $770. In 2008, it is at $870 million.
4-3 votes continue as council approves more slot machines reports The 2/12/09 Wellington Advertiser. After a sparsely attended November public meeting, the Centre Wellington Township council remained firmly split, 4-3, on Monday night when it came to an application to expand the number of slot machines at the Grand River Raceway from 200 to 450.
Racing rivals work to keep home life on track, says a 2/14/09 Victoria Times Colonist. This is the first item I’ve seen about a married couple who ride competing racing horses. (The Jockeys docu-drama is running on Animal Planet - Admin)
Finance
Bankrupt kiosk company owes Edmonton 300 000 says The 2/11/09 Edmonton Journal. (subscription wall - admin)
The company’s largest unsecured creditor is the City of Ottawa, owed $1.9M.
This writer wonders if London is another victim. He always thought that the now closed lottery kiosk, whose manager tried several times to get him banned from the mall, was owned by the OLG.
Lottery prize home gutted in $2M blaze reports The 2/11/09 Calgary Sun.
Dreams were reduced to rubble yesterday as fire destroyed two homes in the southeast community of Cranston, one of which was awarded as the grand prize in the Foothills Hospital Home Lottery.
Why Vegas works, in the 2/12/09 Financial Post. If I understand the item correctly – banks do well if they reward profit-improving employees with trips to Las Vegas!
‘Donald Trump resigned from the board of Trump Entertainment Resorts Inc., the debt-laden casino company he founded, ahead of a possible involuntary bankruptcy filing next week’ reports a 2/14/09 Bloomberg article.
More… Reuters:
Trump Entertainment Resorts Inc, the casino operator named for Donald Trump, filed for bankruptcy protection on Tuesday as recession and declining gambling revenues battered the company and its rivals.
The Chapter 11 filing marks the third plunge into bankruptcy for the company, which was created out of a restructuring in 2005. It also underscores the struggles facing the casino business as recession squeezes casino gambling.
Trump Entertainment owns and operates three casino hotels in Atlantic City, New Jersey, including the Trump Taj Mahal, Trump Plaza and Trump Marina.
British Columbia
Council debate over slot machines resurfaces, says The 2/13/09 Vernon Morning Star. A local politician has reopened the contentious issue of gambling.
Coun. Jack Gilroy has put his colleagues on notice that on Feb. 23, he wants them to debate an existing bylaw, which only allows 300 machines to exist in the community. He would like that increased to 400’.
What this article says about the BCLC makes me sick.
Saskatoon
Casino to reopen in March, reports The 2/10/09 Regina Leader-Post.
The Indian Gaming Authority (SIGA) will officially open its newly redesigned Painted Hand Casino in Yorkton to the public on March 11. The new 43,000-square-foot facility came with a price tag of $30 million. The redesigned casino will feature 217 slot machines, seven live table games, a restaurant offering complete food and beverage services, and a state-of-the-art multi-purpose room designed to accommodate a variety of entertainment events.
Ontario
Black tie bingo to aid five charities, says The 2/9/09 Windsor Star.
Have some gaming fun while supporting five different charities at once on Friday, Feb. 20, when the Rotary Club of Windsor-Roseland presents its seventh annual Black Tie Bingo event.
It costs $75, includes dinner, a night of ‘gaming’, bingo, couples bingo, a prize board worth more than $13,000; it will also feature a silent auction, raffles and a DJ. Corporate tables are available for $700.
Liquor police slap casino, reports The 2/14/09 Windsor Star. Caesars Windsor has lost the right to serve alcohol for a week in its two main bars after inspectors watched its staff serve nine shots of liquor each to two customers in 31 minutes.
Man jailed for wild scene at LCBO in Elgin - Accused was depressed over gambling losses, says The 2/14/09 Recorder and Times. The driver, who appeared to be “crazed,” smashed the car into the brick wall of the liquor store.
Ontario Lottery
Last week we published the titles of articles dealing with OLG’s inside winners of prizes.
On 2/10/09 The Windsor Star reported Retailer hits 100 000 lotto prize.
A downtown retailer’s lottery win over the weekend is raising regulatory eyebrows — but Sam (Soubhi) Assi is taking any suspicions about his sudden great fortune in stride’. He says: ‘I’m not worried about that. I’ve been playing the same numbers for years.
Legalized pot a new tax source says The 2/10/09 Toronto Star.
In past severe economic downturns, governments embraced vice to help stimulate the economy and provide more tax revenue. The U.S. eliminated prohibition in 1933 in the middle of the Great Depression and many Canadian provinces turned to gambling in the early 1990s by adding lotteries and building casinos to create jobs and reduce deficits.
All of us totally agree with the use of the word ‘vice’ for gambling. Our governments ought to be ashamed of using it to bring in money, and many of our fellow-Canadians ought to be ashamed of falling for it! This writer grew up during the Great Depression and very well remembers how careful my parents and older siblings were with whatever money they earned and I never bought a lottery ticket or visited a casino.
That lottery wins can put an end to long friendships becomes clear in the 2/10 Niagara Falls Review headline: Former friends in court over lottery win.
Quebec
Proposed bailout for Quebec horse racing sparks anti-gambling backlash, says a CP item in The 2/8/09 Montreal Gazette. Even before the provincial government transferred control of the racehorse industry to Attractions Hippiques - owned by Liberal-appointed Senator Paul Massicote - in 2006, the municipality had plans to develop mixed-income housing on the 550,000 square metres of this prime Montreal real estate.
‘Put horseracing out of its misery’ proposes a letter to the editor in the 2/9 Gazette. Written by a non-gambler taxpayer who says Re:
“The big gambling complex at hippodrome is a bad idea,” (Opinion, Feb. 5).
I suggest that the horse racing industry be put out of its misery once and for all.
The industry has been bailed out over and over again. As a taxpayer and non-gambler, I say enough is enough./blockquote>Opponents of casino plan mobilize, reports The 2/9/09 Gazette
A coalition of community groups and local politicians are to hold a news conference this morning to denounce the plan, saying it will create more social problems in the neighbourhood and prevent affordable housing from being built on the site of the former Blue Bonnets track.
‘What’s the big deal about gambling?’ asks another letter in Th 2/9/09zette It mentions the fact that there will be in total 1,000 fewer VLTs than had been planned if the Blue Bonnet track isn’t equipped with them.
Beyond our border
Greektown Hoping More Rooms Means More Gambling In Detroit - 2/07/09 Casino Gambling Web.
Revenue at Detroit’s casinos down 5.8 percent in January, says the 2/10/09 Detroit News. The story ends with;
Gaming markets around the world have suffered as consumers pull back on spending during the ongoing recession, though declines here in Detroit haven’t been as severe as larger gambling destination resorts such as Las Vegas, Atlantic City, N.J., and Macau.
On 2/12/09 MSN reports that a 400-room, resort-style hotel is offering a $99-a-night introductory rate as an incentive for new customers.
USA
We like to see articles that talk of more anti-gambling folks. In The
2/9/09 Boston Herald we found an item headed: An anti-casino group is asking legislators to reject gambling’. It compares “slot machines to heroin. Casino Free Mass
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J. Deviet2/10/2009: Canada’s Gambling Watch Network’s Newsletter
Volume 10 Issue 024 CWE February 9 2009
Addiction
‘Problem Gambling May Rise as Economy Falls’ warns an MSNBC article.
2.3 million in U.S. are compulsive gamblers In any given year, about 1 percent of American adults — or some 2.3 million people — are pathological gamblers addicted to the risk and excitement of the wager.
The warning comes from The National Council on Problem Gambling
Lottery
‘Big lottery prizes seem to fall in centre’ heads a letter to the Editor in The 2/2/09 Cape Breton Post complaining that the big prizes go to our country’s centre. We wonder: why is that writer stupid enough to keep wasting his money on buying lottery tickets?
Gambling Propaganda
Recently several newspapers have published negative articles on gambling. On Saturday morning we were disappointed to find a Canwest News Service article written by Monica Zurowski in the Ottawa Citizen that can be seen as propaganda for Las Vegas.
Sports
NFL Should Change Its Opposition to Betting, a 2/6/09 Bloomberg Commentary by Joe Saumarez-Smith, suggest that sports betting should become legal and make profits.
Horseracing
Horse racing loses a home in Vernon, says The 1/2/09 Vernon Morning Star. The North Okanagan Regional District told the Okanagan Equestrian Society (it was formerly the Vernon Agricultural Society) it can no longer use Kin Race Track as of Oct. 31, 2010 and all equipment must be gone by Dec. 31, 2010. If we understand the situation properly, there are many possibilities that this decision will change before that date.
Province to bet 28 million on Hippiques and Something smells at the racetrack, items in The 2/3/09 Montreal Gazette, write that the Quebec government is ready to spend stacks of money to save the four racetracks now managed by Attractions Hippiques and even add a fifth one. Sol Boxenbaum told us this is a totally illegal attempt to keep the province’s horseracing alive.
This entire attempt at opening a new casino on the racetrack site is illegal according to the Criminal Code of Canada Sect. 207. According to that section of the Criminal Code provincial governments may only operate lottery schemes. Gaming in Canada must be conducted and managed by government. Furthermore all profits derived from these activities must be diverted to public good, charities or religious organizations. Attraction Hippiques does not fall into any of those categories. Also there’s a conflict of interest in that Paul Massicotte is a member of the Canadian Senate. Previously there was a Bill introduced by his colleague Senator Jean Lapointe to move VLT machines from bars into racetracks. Now his motivation to pass the Bill becomes questionable.
Hippiques bailout plan fading at the post, an item in The 2/4/09 Gazette, writes that the involved horsemen and breeders do not support the plan of the province.
Magna says slots license fee is in escrow. Magna Entertainment, the Canadian racing company that owns Laurel Park, is in jeopardy of being disqualified from bidding on a license to operate slot machines at the track. Expect to hear more news.
In the Starting Gate Harness Racers Await Fate of Aylmer Hippodrome heads an article in The 2/5/09 Ottawa Citizen.
You can’t survive the way we are. There’s no purse money,’ says Robert O’Dwyer, 68, of the Aylmer Hippodrome, a horse track he’s been coming to all his life. The fate of the track, which has been in bankruptcy protection and may get a provincial bailout, will be determined in days.
The big gambling complex at Hippodrome is a bad idea, is an item in The 2/5/09 Montreal Gazette saying that aside from the financial question, it raises social issues as well. This is one of the articles with a healthy negative outlook at horseracing and gambling.
Smitherman has hopes for Fort Erie track, an item in The 2/6/09 Niagara Falls Review, has this line:
There’s still hope the Fort Erie Race Track can be kept open – but there needs to be more to it than just keeping it in operation as a means of subsidizing horses running around a track, says Smitherman, Ontario’s minister of energy and infrastructure.
British Columbia
Addiction rooms opening at hotel, an article in The Province of 2/5/09, deals mainly with women addicted to substances rather than gambling.
Alberta
Smoking ban cited in reduced VLT cash, is an item in The 2/4/09 Calgary Sun that should have condemned the use of highly addictive VLTs to raise gambling proceeds.
Gambling business has two faces, an article in The 2/5/09 Edmonton Journal, writes of the money gambling provides to the province since it was legalized in ‘69, and of the pain, misery and crime it causes to individuals and families, ending with:
Its consequences on crime, suicide, public health and families in Edmonton may be magnified by an economic downturn, and the public’s understanding of this seems less mature. Unless, of course, we understand this equation of harm and benefit and allow it to continue — feeling that particularly Albertan form of guilt indefinitely.
Saskatchewan
Community loses lotto is an item in The 2/5/09 Leader-Post reporting that the Elfros villagers will soon have to travel at least 24 kms. to fulfill their lottery needs. The Elfros Co-op received a letter from Sask. Lotteries notifying them that their lottery ticket terminal, signs and fixtures would be removed by March 4. Sask. Lotteries requires the minimum ticket sales to reach $36,000 annually while Elfros’ sales only reach $21,188.
Ontario
CAW begin jostling over numbers, vote times, reports The 2/2/09 Niagara Falls Review. There are questions about the outcome of the vote. We’ll wait for the decisions that shall be made and report them. CAW backs off vote at casino is an article in the Review that appeared a day later.
It was “reckless” for the Canadian Auto Workers to rally staff at Niagara’s two casinos to unionize, only to back down at the last minute, says Art Frank, president of the company that manages Niagara Falls Fallsview Casino Resort and Casino Niagara.
Dion machine invades Caesars, The 2/7/09 Windsor Star, reports the casino’s extra efforts to get ready for Celine Dion’s concert at the Caesars Windsor casino.
Ontario Lotteries
We have often wondered if people with high morals will want to work at gambling jobs. Is it normal to expect that honest sailors will work on ships that are run by pirates? We think of that when we see employees (for instance of drug stores) selling their highly addictive scratch tickets to customers. Do they really know what they do? This week we again found items about what is happening at the Ontario Lottery Corporation.
For now we’ll just quote their dates and titles: 2/4/09: Number of insider lottery wins in Ontario higher than previously thought : 2/5/09: ‘Insider’ jackpots hit $198 million; 2/5/09: OLG to announce changes; 2/6/09: Lottery bosses banned from playing after probe; 2/6/09 Lottery’s dirty laundry. 2/6/09: Ontario may need to ban lotto retailers from playing 2/6/09 The Canadian Press, The Cape Breton Post; 2/7/09: The OLG and the odds, Windsor Star.
Quebec
Vanier College has banned card playing after serious gambling issues emerged, says the 3/2/09 CTV Montreal.
Authorities at Vanier College have banned card playing by students on campus. According to the academic dean, some students were thousands of dollars in debt and there were tales of loan sharks coming to the school.
Casino hurts poor - How soon we forget! heads an article in The 2/5/09 Montreal Gazette.
Less than three years ago, expensive impact studies were produced by the departments of public security and of public health showing that the likelihood of high risks to public health and security would result from the move of the Montreal Casino to the community of Point St. Charles. A more recent study shows that one in four VLT users develops a serious gambling addiction.
New Brunswick
Clubs upset by VLT loss, reports the 1/31/09 Times & Transcript. The number of VLT sites are being slashed by more than half province-wide. We consider it a shame that this province still uses VLTs to make money from gamblers while VLTs are even more addictive than slots. It’s a shame that a club uses them to finance its work.
Gambling addict must repay nearly $6K says The 2/4/09 Telegraph-Journal. A 26-year-old single mother, who defrauded the Department of Social Development of $5,971 in order to support her gambling habit, has been ordered to make full restitution by the end of 2010.
Beyond our border
The 2/1/09 Buffalo News reports;
The organization that is seeking to shut down the Seneca Nation’s Buffalo casino says it plans to continue its efforts, despite recent setbacks in Washington and in federal court. …The Senecas said they hope Skretny’s latest ruling will allow them to move forward with building a larger casino that will employ 1,200 people. They currently operate a small, temporary facility off Michigan Avenue, which opened in 2007.
Poker used to lure gamblers to racetrack says The 2/4/09 Detroit News. Northville Downs found a loophole in state laws and will offer charity no-limit Texas hold ‘em every week from Thursdays through Sundays. Michigan allows charities to obtain state licenses to run casino games four days at a time.
United States
OUR VIEW - Don’t bet on gambling to spur economy, warns The 1/31/09 Holland Sentinel, a Michigan Newspaper. It states the opposite of an item we mentioned in last week’s Newsletter which said:
State lawmakers bet gambling can help with budgets’ An 1/25/09 Associated Press article says ‘Proposals to allow or expand slots or casinos are percolating in at least 14 states, tempting legislators and governors at a time when many must decide between cutting services and raising taxes.
No reader comments yet - add yours See related articles: Activism, Canada, Gambling Watch Canada Network Newsletter
J. Deviet2/3/2009: Canada’s Gambling Watch Network’s Newsletter
Volume 10 Issue 023 CWE February 2 2009
Youth
Education is a sure bet to show gambling risks, is an article in The 1/27/09 Ottawa Citizen is saying that research shows that youth gambling is a serious problem needing to be addressed by the OLGC and by educators. Bruno Schlumberger, an aspiring elementary school teacher, says:
I believe that society can do more to reduce youth gambling addiction. Research that I have studied indicates that about 55 per cent of youth ages 10 to 17 years are recreational or casual gamblers. These are the children I plan to teach who are so susceptible to gambling’. We quote: ‘Internet gambling is a widely advertised and accessible form of gambling to youths. Many anti-gambling advertisements and addiction treatments are directed towards helping the adult population, as it is for this group that the gaming industry was designed. However, we need to open our eyes to the risks posed to the mental health of our youth population.
We totally agree.
Lotteries
On the first days of this week we found at least seven articles on this subject. They dealt with an Ontario lottery that had a $43 million jackpot and caused huge line-ups at lottery counters. We see this as proof that greed, promoted by our provinces’ press, TV and radio advertising, causes many Canadians to waste their money on lottery tickets.
Another news story is the bankruptcy of a company that had some 180 kiosks all over Canada where lottery tickets could be bought. On January 30 Johannes noticed that the main lottery counter in the nearby mall is closed. The 3 other lotto outlets are busy!
Hortons gals chasing winner is one of the items in a number of papers about the 6/49 multi-million winner who promised and really gave $30,000 to the girls he worked with.
Finance
V stands for Value in Las Vegas is an article in The 1/31/09 Calgary Herald reporting that Vegas never looked so good as now.
Each month, Las Vegas becomes home to an array of new shows, hotels, attractions, restaurants and shops.
Addiction
How gambling addiction works in the brain, is a New York Daily News item posted by the Casino News of January 30. It points to so many other articles on gambling addiction that none of our volunteers has the training (or time!) to do justice to it. We hope that at least some of Canada’s addiction experts will look into this matter.
Poker
Dickson makes poker history, an article in The 1/27/09 Regina Leader-Post, writes that Sam Dickson, 43, of Oxbow, is the first Canadian player to win the North Dakota Texas Hold’em Championship Tournament, securing for himself $35,000 in American cash - the largest chunk of the $103,500 prize payout. The North Dakota Texas Hold’em Championship Tournament ran from Dec. 31 to Jan. 3. It’s ranked as the third or fourth largest tournament outside Las Vegas. Players from Saskatchewan, Alberta, Manitoba, and 10 U.S. states participated in the competition.
Horse Racing
Horse Cash infusion gives new life to SRW, an article in The 1/24/09 PEI Guardian:
More than $3.5 million has been tagged to transform Summerside Raceway into one of the top entertainment facilities in Atlantic Canada.
…The federal government through Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency and Service Canada is investing more than $1.5 million in Summerside Raceway. The Atlantic Lottery Corporation announced its capital investment, which is in excess of $2 million, towards a new racing facility and entertainment centre.
The item shows that for PEIers horseracing is very important.
Race City’s future low on gas, says The 1/27/09 Edmonton Sun.
Proponents of the popular speedway on Calgary’s eastern border had been attempting to extend the facility’s lease beyond 2010, when the city plans to take it over and expand operations at the nearby Shepard landfill site. But a move by Ald. Ric McIver to give the raceway some breathing room until 2020 was shot down with a 7-7 vote at council yesterday, leaving Race City without a track in less than a year.
The track has been operating at the same location for 40 years.
Horse Talks continue as deadline extended at Fort Erie, reports the 1/27/09 Buffalo News.
Track owner Nordic Gaming Corp., which had set a noon deadline for word on a $35 million Ontario government loan to finance the sale of the track to a new owner, extended that deadline after the Ontario Racing Commission earlier granted a two-month extension of the track’s racing license, which was due to expire on Saturday.
Horse racing visionary dies says The 1/28/09 Calgary Herald. Andy Bryant, 45, died of cancer. He was president of Horse Racing Alberta since its inception in 2002.
More pink slips issued at Fort Erie Race Track, reports The 1/30/09 Niagara Falls Review. Item. Close to 50 slips were issued to employees in addition to the 190 handed out in December
After zoning vote horsetrack looks south for slots says a 3-page Jan. 30 Scarboroughleader article. The track might more to the United States if we understand it rightly.
Quebec racetrack operator Attractions Hippiques, in creditor protection since June, says failure to get it extended next week would mean “a strong possibility of bankruptcy” and cancellation of all horse racing activities in the province this year’ says The 1/31/09 Montreal Gazette. The province will extend 28 million dollarsover 25 years with 300 VLT’s permitted.
British Columbia
Gambling industry starts to feel pinch reports The 1/27/09 Victoria Times Colonist, while Great Canadian cuts casino, office jobs, says the Vancouver Sun on the same day.
B.C.’s biggest gambling company has cut more than 300 jobs from its casino workforce and slashed about 50 head office positions as it prepares for even fewer cash-strapped customers to play with their money in a recession…
and from The Sun:
The Richmond-based company that operates 10 casinos and five race tracks in B.C., Ontario, Nova Scotia and Washington state, including Island casinos in View Royal and Nanaimo, has cut back its hours and laid off staff at all operations and at every level of the company. That has been done to deal with what it calls the uncertainty of the current economic situation.
Ontario
A letter to the Editor appearing in The 1/27/09 Windsor Star suggests that Caesars Windsor Coliseum is for mega-stars, while the Capitol Theatre is a venue for people who want to experience the local arts. The writer would like to see Caesars throw a few dollars in the pot of the Capitol Theatre.
Gambler back at the casino, says The 1/27/09 Sarnia Observer. A local woman who violated a court-ordered casino ban, imposed for fraudulently financing her gambling habits, got six months’ probation in Sarnia’s court.
CAW gearing up for casino vote, says The 1/27/09 Niagara Falls Review.
Canadian Auto Workers president Ken Lewenza is scheduled to make an announcement in Niagara Falls about his union’s attempt to organize workers at Niagara Fallsview Casino Resort and Casino Niagara. The union could announce it has filed for a certification vote to represent 3,000 of the casinos’ 4,500 workers.
Holy Cross School Parent Council will be hosting a bingo, The 1/28/09 Brantford Expositor announces this unholy gambling meeting for Feb. 12.
Casino workers voting again on unionizing, writes The 1/29/09 Niagara Falls Reviews.
Within a week, 3,000 casino workers will choose to join the Canadian Auto Workers or continue working without a union as they have for 13 years.
Casino staff vote says The 1/30/09 Niagara Falls Review. CAW officials applied for the vote after months of organizing activity. More than half of the workers have already signed union cards, according to the CAW. It’s expected that the vote will take two days to complete. (The vote has been withdrawn by the CAW 03/02/09 - admin)
OPP charge man in gambling bust, reports The 1/30/09 Mississauga News.
The organized crime enforcement bureau of the OPP said it was acting on a tip about illegal video gambling machines. An investigation revealed that illegal payouts were being provided from video machines at the National Sports Bar located at 2580 Stanfield Rd., Unit 2.
Prince Edward Island
What now of PEI’s gaming strategy? The 1/28/09 Guardian asks the PEI’s gov’t .
The announcement last Friday of $3.5 million for the Summerside Raceway is great news for the track, the city and harness racing, but there are other issues in play here. It appears the province’s responsible gaming strategy has been compromised with the announcement that a second racino is coming to P.E.I., and this presents a challenge for the province.
We look forward to hear more of this change in the gam(bl)ing plans!
Nova Scotia
Missing cabbie in debt $142,200 before going bankrupt in 2006 reports The 1/30/09 Halifax Herald.
The documents say he used credit cards to fund his gambling activities, used some credit cards to pay debts owed on others, and successfully applied to increase his borrowing limits a year before his insolvency. He increased his debt by $70,000 during that year.
Beyond our border
No, casino can’t rig multi-play machines is an answer to a question in the 1/29/09 Detroit Free Press. With landmarks like this who needs slums? asks The 1/30/09 Buffalo Biz Journal. It describes the barren steelwork marking the site where the unfinished $333M Seneca Buffalo Creek Casino was being constructed. The work was suspended late last summer, supposedly due to the deteriorating economy.
United States
State lawmakers bet gambling can help with budgets, from a 1/25/09 Associated Press article
Proposals to allow or expand slots or casinos are percolating in at least 14 states, tempting legislators and governors at a time when many must decide between cutting services and raising taxes.
New Zealand
The latest Massey University study has found that more than 70,000 New Zealanders are struggling with gambling, says a 1/29/09 article from that country.
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J. Deviet