State Senate passes new gaming vote plan

Tuesday, May 11th 2004, 5:06 pm

By: News On 6

OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) -- The Oklahoma Senate voted Tuesday to let the people vote Nov. 2 on allowing pari-mutuel horse racing tracks to operate electronic gaming devices now played only at Indian casinos.

The vote was 31-17 for Senate Bill 1252, which repeals an early gaming bill that had been targeted in a referendum petition drive by anti-gambling activists.

The bill now goes to the House for action later this week. If it passes the House, it will put the gaming question before a vote in this year's general election.

Rep. Forrest Claunch had launched an initiative petition drive to overturn the earlier gaming bill.

Claunch, D-Midwest City, has said his group will continue collecting signatures on petitions to drum up opposition to the new gaming plan, which repeals the gaming act signed by Gov. Brad Henry in March.

Twenty-eight Democrats and three Republicans voted for the latest gaming measure. It was opposed by 14 Republicans, including Sen. Owen Laughlin, R-Woodward, who said the state was not getting a good deal on gambling taxes.

Sen. Dick Wilkerson, D-Atwood, said the only thing to be decided by Tuesday's vote was "whether or not the people of Oklahoma will vote on this sooner rather than later."

It was considered unlikely that Claunch's group would have been able to gather the required signatures and clear all legal hurdles in time to get the issue to a November vote.

Some supporters of the gaming legislation had expressed concern that the petition drive would tie up the measure for two years or more, costing schools millions of dollars.

The legislation is expected to raise $71 million the first full year it is in effect. Most of the money will go to schools, with some of it set aside for college scholarships.

Henry has pushed for the legislation, saying it will save the horse racing industry and thousands of jobs while creating the first new revenue stream for schools in 14 years.

The proposed gaming law sets up a model gaming compact with Indian tribes and allows the state regulatory authority over tribal casinos for the first time.

It incorporates language in a proposed trailer bill that include $250,000 to help deal with gambling addicts and increases by 100 the number of games that eventually could be played at Remington Park in Oklahoma City, the state's largest pari-mutuel track.