Group starts collecting signatures to legalize casino gambling at Nebraska racetracks

Omaha.com

LINCOLN — Backers of expanded gambling in Nebraska are launching their initiative petition drive with donations exceeding $250,000.

Almost all of the money has come from Ho-Chunk Inc., the economic development wing of the Winnebago Tribe of Nebraska, according to the petition group’s first campaign finance report.

The group, Keep the Money in Nebraska, announced Tuesday that it is ready to start hitting the streets to collect signatures on petitions aimed at allowing casino gambling at the state’s racetracks.

Former State Sen. Scott Lautenbaugh of Omaha, the group’s spokesman, said the petitions would give Nebraskans a chance to vote on expanding gambling and saving the state’s horse racing industry.

“I think we should do well,” he said. “In recent years, Nebraskans have seen literally billions of dollars leave our state for gambling options in surrounding states.”

The Rev. Al Riskowski, executive director of the Nebraska Family Alliance, said he has not talked with other gambling foes about how they will respond to the petitions.

But he said he expects that his group will fight the new gambling proposals, just as it and other groups have battled past efforts to legalize casinos in Nebraska.

Opponents of expanded gambling have carried the day so far against initiative petitions and legislative proposals.

“Nebraska Family Alliance opposes expanded gambling because we feel that typically who it hurts are those who can least afford it,” Riskowski said.

Gov. Pete Ricketts, who spent 10 years on the board of the anti-gambling group, Gambling With the Good Life, had not read the petitions yet and could not comment on them, according to spokeswoman Brittany Hardin. However, she said the governor remains opposed to expanded gambling.

The money for the new petition effort has come from three groups linked with horse racing, according to a report filed with the Nebraska Accountability and Disclosure Commission.

Ho-Chunk, which owns the former Atokad Park racetrack in South Sioux City, had put $226,146 into the petition effort as of Sept. 25.

The Horsemen’s Benevolent & Protective Association, which represents the state’s horse owners and trainers, contributed $11,200 and Omaha Exposition & Racing, the operators of simulcast racing facilities in Omaha and Lincoln, gave $17,500.

Lance Morgan, CEO of Ho-Chunk, estimated earlier that it would cost about $1 million to collect enough signatures to put the issues on the ballot.

That’s about what it cost backers of two recent petition drives, one to raise the state’s minimum wage and one seeking to keep the death penalty on the books in Nebraska.

In this case, circulators will be collecting signatures on three petitions. But the drive may benefit from a new law allowing circulators to be paid by the signature, instead of by the hour.

Lautenbaugh said one petition proposes a state constitutional amendment allowing for games of chance at approved locations.

The other petitions propose laws, one allowing and regulating gambling at licensed racetracks and the other directing how tax revenues from gambling would be divided.

The group is proposing a 20 percent tax on gross gambling revenues, with three-quarters of the funds going to the state and the rest to local governments where the casinos are situated.

The state’s currently licensed racetracks are Horsemen’s Park in Omaha, Lincoln Race Course in Lincoln, Fonner Park in Grand Island, Columbus Exposition and Racing in Columbus and Fairplay Park in Hastings.

If the measures pass, Morgan said it should be a simple matter of relicensing Atokad Park.

To put the issues on the November 2016 ballot, Keep the Money In Nebraska will need to get valid signatures from 10 percent of registered voters, or about 113,900 people, on the proposed constitutional amendment petition.

Signatures from 7 percent of registered voters, or about 79,700 people, will be needed on each of the petitions for the proposed laws. The drive also has to collect signatures from at least 5 percent of registered voters in a minimum of 38 counties.

The signatures will be due by July 7.

The Nebraska Constitution requires signatures on petitions proposing constitutional amendments or laws to be turned in at least four months before the general election.

In contrast, signatures on petitions seeking to repeal laws passed by the Legislature must be turned in within 90 days of the end of the legislative session at which the law was passed.

Signatures on the petition seeking to undo the legislative repeal of the death penalty had to be turned in by Aug. 27.

Lautenbaugh said he expects that the group will use paid and volunteer circulators.

“We’re going to work hard, we’re going to be everywhere,” he said.

Keep the Money in Nebraska has opened offices in Omaha and Lincoln. Those interested in signing the petitions or interested in helping to circulate petitions can find more information at www.KeepYourMoneyNE.com.

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