Watching lawmakers and lobbyists dither over how to legalize and regulate online poker in the state of California is like watching paint dry, except, the paint never seems to dry.
There was so much excitement when bills to legalize online poker arrived on the scene in California, now for the most part, many gambling industry professionals just want to be woken up when something actually gets passed.
Behind the scenes and intense political war wages on in the state of California as lobbyists and political campaigns are benefiting from the protracted discussion, collecting millions of dollars from the card rooms, racetracks and Indian tribes seeking to shape the future of Internet wagering.
The conversation centers on how it should be implemented and which of the competing interests will reap the benefits. That creates even more business for Capitol advocates, as they sort out differences among their clients.
There’s so much money that’s involved and so many interests affected that the issues of contention far surpass those on agreement.
It’s hard to find exact numbers on how much money has been spent lobbying and the secretary of state’s office does not organize lobbying data by bill number, plus lobbying dollars are always hard to trace.
The Fresnobee provided some disclosure forms filed by some of the interested parties which provided a glimpse of the business being generated by this debate:
• The Morongo and San Manuel bands of Indians, sponsors of one of the Internet gambling bills, together spent more than $337,000 on lobbying last year. They have spent nearly that much more – $304,000 – on lobbying just in the first half of this year.
• Some tribes, which oppose the Morongo and San Manuel bill because they say it doesn’t give them enough opportunity to make money on Internet gambling, spent about $1.2 million on lobbying in 2010. They are on track to spend at least that much again this year.
• Major card rooms and racetracks that want to operate Internet gambling spent another half-million dollars on lobbying last year, and this year are spending at a similar pace.
Even still, these figures aren’t a full indication of how much money is being thrown around as these figures don’t show how much gambling proponents are spending on consultants.
There’s two bills being pushed right now with different visions for how the state should engage. While both limit the network to players inside state lines, Sen. Lou Correa’s bill would legalize only Internet poker, while SB 45 by Sen. Rod Wright, D-Inglewood, would create a system for users to gamble online on all kinds of games.
The longer it takes for legislation to be passed the more money that must be spent pushing one interest or another. The question is, which side and which interests have the deeper pockets?
