on the campaign trail. This won’t be decided by 13 members of the council – and that’s Weaver and Brown’s point.
Good Odds for Internet Gambling? For the last year, Internet gambling has been legal in the District. It was in late 2010 that a provision was surreptitiously worked into a supplemental budget bill by Councilmember Michael Brown (I-At Large) allowing the D.C. Lottery to make the District the first jurisdiction in the country to legally allow its residents to gamble online. By April 2011, the D.C. Lottery was beginning preparations for a system that would offer four games and could raise upwards of $15 million in its first three years of operation. But since then, an outcry over how an issue as controversial as Internet gambling could have passed through the council without even the slightest bit of public input – the language took up all of a quarter-page of a broader budget bill – has forced the D.C. Lottery and its supporters to put the brakes on the plan. Implementation was stopped, and D.C. Lottery officials scheduled a series of town hall hearings to explain the program to residents. Finally, on January 26, right after this column went to print, a council committee gathered for a hearing on Internet gambling. But in an indication of how convoluted and compromised the entire discussion over Internet gambling has become, the hearing was only to discuss a repeal bill introduced by Councilmember Tommy Wells (D-Ward 6) and Phil Mendelson (D-At Large). In essence, the usual democratic process that sees proposed legislation go through a thorough public vetting
that includes hearings, markups and multiple votes was turned on its head – Internet gambling is law, and the public is only being given a chance to comment on whether or not to repeal it. The troubles run deeper, though. According to a January report by D.C. Inspector General Charles Willoughby, D.C. CFO Natwar Gandhi improperly added language that would allow Internet gambling to even be considered to a 2008 lottery contract worth $120 million. Additionally, debate still exists over the structure and mission of the city’s Lottery Board, which hasn’t been fully staffed since 1996. Critics also say that the town halls were a sham – under-publicized, lightly attended and purposely packed with supporters of Internet gambling. (A December D.C. Lottery report said that of the 254 people that attended the meetings, 68 percent were in favor.) But despite the questionable groundwork upon which the city’s Internet gambling law is built, Wells and Mendelson’s bill still faces an uphill battle. A person with knowledge of council dynamics told us that the votes likely weren’t there to sustain a full repeal. Still, opponents of Internet gambling are massing their forces as best they can. As of the time of this writing, 117 witnesses were scheduled to speak at the hearing on the repeal bill. Given the controversies that Internet gambling has already survived, not even that many people can stop something that seems like a foregone conclusion. We’re certainly not betting on it. Martin Austermuhle is the Editor-in-Chief of DCist.com and a freelance writer. He lives in Petworth. ★
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