The House Select Committee on Gaming Monday evening released the first in a series of reports to study the impact of gaming in Florida. The report wascommissioned by both House and Senate Select Committees on Gaming and was conducted by Spectrum Gaming Group, selected through a competitive procurement process in April.
I look forward to digesting the information in this report and will consider it before any decisions are made about the future of gaming in Florida, Select Committee on Gaming Chairman Rob Schenck, R-Spring Hill, said in a press statement. I look forward to working with Chairman (Garrett) Richter on the issue next fall.
The first report is focused on an Assessment of the Florida gaming industry and its economic effects. The report is availablehere.
A complete description of the studys scope of work is contained on pages 11 through 13 of theInvitation to Negotiate.
As soon as the report was released, Richter, R-Naples, issued the following memo to all legislators:
"Drawing on Spectrum Gaming Groups broad experience, the report evaluates the history and current state of gambling in Florida. It assesses economic and fiscal impacts of gaming subsectors, changes over time, and projections for the future. It also addresses social and economic costs of gambling and describes differences in how various states regulate gambling.
"Part 1A is the first of three reports. The remaining installments are due by October 1, 2013:
"Part 1B. Assessment of potential changes and economic effects.
"Part 2. Statistical relationships between gaming and economic variables for communities.
"The President and Speaker commissioned the two-part gaming study to lay the groundwork and factual foundation for important policy choices the Legislature will consider during the 2014 Regular Session. Spectrum Gaming Group was charged with delivering an independent and unbiased assessment.
"The report does not, and will not make policy recommendations. It will be the Gaming Committees responsibility to review gambling statutes, to address the ambiguities, inconsistencies, and exceptions in current law, and to craft an action plan. Over the next few months, we will evaluate Part 1A of the study. Public hearings will be scheduled for the fall of 2013, as directed by the President and Speaker, so legislators have the opportunity to listen to all interested parties."
Spectrums project team, announced in April, included Dr. Howard Shaffer, associate professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School and director of the Division on Addiction at The Cambridge Health Alliance, a Harvard Medical School teaching affiliate; Regional Economic Models Inc. (REMI); Doug Walker, associate professor of economics at the College of Charleston; and, Lori Pennington-Gray, associate director of the Eric Friedheim Tourism Institute at the University of Florida.
Ryan Duffy, spokesman for House Speaker Will Weatherford, had said earlier Monday that the second part was due out in October and would be far more detailed, "more holistic," addressing gaming's impact on cities and counties, its costs to social services, revenue projections -- virtually everything.
"Absolutely no decisions are going to be made until all parts of the study are complete and in," Duffy said.
Meanwhile, the Orlando-based group that opposes gambling, No Casinos in Florida, continues to pound Spectrum. In a letter No Casinos sent to Weatherford and Senate President Don Gaetz, it claims consultants are "too cozy with casinos" and any report would be a propaganda tool for the casino gambling industry.
The House and Senate jointly signed the contract for this two-part, $388,845 gaming study with Spectrum in April after a competitive bidding process began in February. Spectrum beat out seven vendors, two of whom were also named as finalists -- The Innovation Group and MGT of America.
Spectrum has extensive experience in providing independent studies of gaming in a variety of jurisdictions, including Massachusetts, Connecticut, Illinois, Kentucky, Louisiana, and Ohio, Weatherford, R-Wesley Chapel, said in April. I look forward to reviewing their report as we take a holistic view of the role gaming plays in Florida's economy.
No Casinos President John Sowinski nevertheless claims the Legislature chose the wrong consultants. Hetold the Tampa Tribunein May,In terms of trying to come up with social and economic calculations, they have a conflict of interest.
Leadership in the House and Senate has said the more impartial a vendor is, the more expensive it is, and the less experience it has in other states. A study by academics, they say, would have cost more, taken longer and been less comprehensive.
Allison McCoy, senior vice president of marketing forSpectrum Gaming Group, described her company's mission to Sunshine State News like this: "Our job is to tell people not what they want to hear but what they need to know."
Reach Nancy Smith at nsmith@sunshinestatenews or at 228-282-2423.
