Industry warned of “missiles” by “enemies of gaming”

Robert Macy

Wednesday, Dec. 15, 1999 | 10:20 a.m.

Dodging "missiles" from the "enemies of gaming" will be a top priority for Nevada's lifeblood gambling industry in the next session of Congress, tourism officials were told Tuesday.

Frank Fahrenkopf, president of the American Gaming Association, issued the warning at the 16th annual Governor's Conference on Travel and Tourism.

Representatives of the "religious right," working in conjunction with gambling opponents on the left of the political spectrum, will be battling casino interests in Congress on the "slots for tots" controversy, Fahrenkopf said. The issue involves slot machines which opponents claim are targeted at young people as a means of creating a new generation of gamblers.

Fahrenkopf also warned that the NCAA is likely to press a campaign to outlaw betting on college sports in Nevada sports books.

"The enemies of gaming have been firing missiles at us," Fahrenkopf said, citing opponents in Congress and some members of the National Gambling Impact Study Commission.

Efforts to push anti-gambling issues in Congress may be mitigated by a session shortened due to the 2000 presidential elections.

"It's going to be a very short year, probably 65 or 70 days," Fahrenkopf said.

Sen. Richard Bryan, D-Nev., said he expected the college sports betting bill to surface in the next session along with issues such as a ban on Internet gambling and the "slots for tots" issue.

Republican presidential candidate John McCain said last week he intended to investigate the use of slot machines featuring what he called "child-enticing themes." The Arizona senator said he may conduct congressional hearings on the issue and asked the Federal Trade Commission to investigate.

McCain said the new slot machines utilize images from popular games and television shows such as "The Pink Panther," "South Park," "Candy Land" and "Monopoly."

Steve DuCharme, chairman of the Nevada Gaming Control Board, has said new regulations regarding such slot machines will be submitted to the parent Gaming Commission this week.

Fahrenkopf noted the regulatory action and said the issue should be left to the state to regulate.

Fahrenkopf said he was approached by the NCAA earlier this year with word the agency would seek to ban legal betting on college games.

Banning college sports betting in Nevada would not solve the problem, Fahrenkopf said, since surveys indicate up to $300 billion is spent annually on sports betting and only $2.3 billion is bet at Nevada books. Nevada is the only state where legal betting is offered.

Fahrenkopf said NCAA representatives threatened to push the issue in Congress, using the argument that members could "support the teen-agers, the college athletes of America, or support gamblers in Las Vegas."

Fahrenkopf said the NCAA had recently signed an 11-year, $6 billion package for college basketball rights, adding "Who's making the money off the backs of teen-agers in America?"

He challenged the NCAA to use some of the basketball money to initiate gambling awareness programs among college athletes.

Bryan said that although the United States has a $1.8 trillion budget, "astonishingly, we're the only country in the world with a substantial tourism program and no government participation."

That sentiment was echoed by keynote speaker Marilyn Carlson Nelson, president of Minneapolis-based travel conglomerate Carlson Companies.

"We're the only nation in the industrialized world that does not contribute one penny" to supporting tourism programs, she said.

"We must convince our leadership to take us seriously as an industry," she told some 1,300 travel and tourism officials.

Nelson said that worldwide, travel and tourism represents a $3.5 trillion industry, makes up 12 percent of the world's domestic economy, employs 200 million people and ranks third behind food stores and the auto industry.

The industry must do something about violence against travelers in America and the perception of violence foreign visitors have of the U.S., Nelson said. She suggested a Hollywood campaign turning away from violence and picturing the U.S. as a "beautiful, welcoming place...capturing the hearts and minds of the global marketplace."

Gov. Kenny Guinn said Nevada's tourism focus had to stretch beyond Las Vegas and reach areas like Tonopah, Elko, Ely and Caliente.

"We have beautiful hotels," Guinn said, "but one location is not strong enough that we can predicate our survival on it."

The conference runs through Wednesday at the Paris Las Vegas hotel-casino.