Gambling on our kids' future(Texas)

Corpus Christi Caller-Times ^ | April 20, 2004 | Denise McNamara

[SwinneySwitch]

In Austin, as the Texas Legislature begins its special session, there are many options to help fund education, such as closing the franchise tax loophole and increasing state taxes on cigarettes. But the idea of expanding our state lottery to include video lottery terminals (VLTs) is a risky gamble that should be rejected.

When it comes to relying on gambling to help finance education, Texans still remember the broken promises of more than a decade ago when we were sold a Texas lottery as the ideal method to generate revenue for schools. Texans embraced the idea at the polls, hoping that the lottery would solve our school-finance woes.

Though we were promised that money from the lottery would go to education, it never did. Thirteen years later, we face the same crisis, and now some in Austin want us to believe that expanding a failed program is the way out. Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me.

Given the history of lottery-funded school-finance programs, the fact that proponents are calling this proposal a "lottery expansion" should set off warning lights. But this proposal is more than that; it would result in full-blown slot-machine casinos.

Of course, proponents want you to believe that they will simply add a few slot machines at the six existing racetracks. But in order to generate the amount of revenue being talked about in Austin, slot machines will need to generate as much as the more than nearly 40,000 slot machines do in all of Louisiana, a state with 14 riverboat casinos, one land-based casino, three racetrack casinos and video poker at almost 3,000 locations.

Proponents, in their efforts to find a quick fix for school funding, have not researched the options available to them. The plan does not even call for a competitive bidding process, where gaming firms in other states have paid as much as $500 million for licensing rights alone.

Along with a profitable bidding system, proponents are turning a blind eye to the need for a regulatory body. Other states with legalized slot machine casinos have immense regulatory commissions with strict and complicated laws. It took one year to set up the Texas Lottery Commission, which provides a fraction of the type of accounting and regulation that would be needed for slot machine casinos. It will take years, and millions in tax dollars, to be ready to allow slot machine casinos. Yet proponents want slot machine casinos, and they want them now.

In addition to the concerns I have over the lack of planning and foresight in this unreliable casino proposal to fund education, I simply believe slot machines are the wrong way to finance education. In order to raise the funds projected by the proponents, Texans will have to lose $1 billion a year in gambling.

To recap the plan: Proponents want to expand a failed effort to fund education with gambling, creating a slot machine casino industry the size of Louisiana's, and want to do so without a competitive bid process or regulatory commission. They want to take an incredible risk while gambling with the future of public education in Texas.

Attempting to fund education with slot machine gambling is a shortsighted plan that is fiscally irresponsible and morally wrong. It has not worked in the past and it doesn't have a realistic chance to working now.

Denise McNamara, of Dallas, is the Republican National Committeewoman for Texas.

[PaulaB]

They better figure our some way to fund the poor schools. Last year our school district distributed $55 million dollars to poorer schools in the Dallas/FT Worth school district. The Robin Hood law is a catastrophe. This again goes back to parent responsibility .....do right for your kids by getting an education or working hard to be able to afford property taxes in a great district. It is my tax money that should fund my kids..others are not my responsibility.

[Monty22]

It is a total socialist scam. Also, the stupid lottery was supposed to help, and now they still want more. Horse racing is ok, lottery ok.. But any more is getting silly.

[Buffalo Bob]

Gambling helps only the Gaming Industry, and the illegal elements that always accompany it. Keep Texas beautiful, and keep the gaming industry OUT!

[Blue Screen of Death]

The other big problem with the tax one district and give it to another district is that the person taxed has no vote in the recipient district. We fought a war about this taxation and representation thingie.

How about we educate two kids per family and if someone chooses to have more children, they pay for them. I don't like paying for some family with eight kids in the system.

[eastforker]

Sit down at any Texas Holdem table in La. and you will find 8 of the ten there are from Texas.Texans love to gamble, I can find a game on any given night here in Houston,ranging from nickel,dime,quarter to a pot limit 5K buy in. Might as well keep it in the state rather than send it east to La.

[Proud_texan]

I'm not big on gambling but it wasn't the stupid lottery, it was the lying, thieving Ann Richards and the commie pols at the time that pulled the bait and switch lottery deal.

As noted by someone else the traffic from Tx. to La. for gambling excersions are draining a lot of revenue.

Of course the real solution is to to reform the education management structure but that ain't gonna happen, so until then.....

[Lunatic Fringe]

Hey, here's an idea...

Throw all the ILLEGAL IMMIGRANTS OUT of the Texas public schools!

[mtbopfuyn]

This again goes back to parent responsibility .....do right for your kids by getting an education or working hard to be able to afford property taxes in a great district. It is my tax money that should fund my kids..others are not my responsibility.

While I agree with you that my tax money should fund MY kids' education, I disagree with your affording porperty taxes in a great district will equal a good education. It does go back to parental involvement though. IF that parents would make sure their kids got up every morning and actually walked through the school doors at 8 AM, and IF the parents would make sure their kids don't act like wild animals during class, and IF parents discussed their homework every night, and IF parents would make sure their kids were asleep at a decent hour, and IF parents stayed home and were good role models for their kids, and IF parents just CARED then it wouldn't matter how many $$$ were shuffled into or out of a particular school.

But no, parents are too selfish with their own sorry lives to bother raising good kids who value an education. Some true examples - An 11 year old was left to run wild and was caught smoking dope and having sex with an older male on school property. Another family thinks nothing of going out until closing time on Thursday nights. They argue they're good parents because they take their kids with them, but can't comprehend that kids who don't get home until 2 AM simply can't pass Friday morning tests and wonder why each child is failing. Another kid is so screwed up because of the parent's dope parties. Several in special ed are there because their moms cared more about drugs than their pregnancies. The formative years are before they start school, so who is in charge of them at that age?

[valkyrieanne]

Exactly. And how is "Texas education reform" going to change any of this?

[mtbopfuyn]

It ain't.

[ladylib]

Too bad you don't like paying for 8 kids in the system. When the state MANDATES under penalty of law that children have to attend public school unless their parents are willing to educate their children in an alternative setting (as well as paying taxes for schools they don't use), then you, the taxpayer, are obligated to pay for their education. Many people who have NO children in the system realize that they have to pay school taxes whether they like it or not.

If you don't like it, lobby to get rid of compulsory education laws.

[ladylib]

No, you can't do that! It makes too much sense!

[deport]

How much of the following is truth or fiction? Anyone know......

WHERE DOES THE MONEY GO?

Since the Lottery began in 1992, more than $11.3 billion* has been generated for the State of Texas! The following chart illustrates where a one-dollar Texas Lottery purchase goes.

^* Revenue to the State of Texas. Between 1992 and 1997, about $4.9 billion in lottery revenues went to the General Revenue Fund. Effective September 1, 1997, legislative action dedicated lottery revenue to the Foundation School Fund. Since 1997, $6.1 billion has gone to the Foundation School Fund, used for school districts' public education services at the local level. In FY 2003, lottery contributions equaled $888.2 million.

Unclaimed lottery prize funds revert to the State to be appropriated for health care, medical education, and other programs authorized by the state legislature.

^** Lottery Prizes. Projected prize payout.

[solo gringo]

If your taxes should pay for your children then who am i paying for.I have not had a child in school for 25 years but my school taxes is twice as much as my property taxes.I think it time to educate the kids of Texas and charge anyone not from Texas that is taking advantage of our school system.Tax the consumer and not just property owners.

[Democratshavenobrains]

Remember last year when they all fled the state? Good times, good times.