Expanded gambling may help Kansas school crisis

Carl Manning

Wednesday, June 22, 2005 | 9:39 a.m.

TOPEKA, Kan. -- Expanded gambling won't mean instant riches for the state, but it could provide enough revenue in time to satisfy a state Supreme Court mandate that legislators quickly come up with more money for public schools.

The Legislature begins a special session today because the court decreed lawmakers failed their constitutional duty to provide suitable funding for education and must come up with more money.

That ruling has many conservative Republicans still complaining about "judicial activism" and how the court overstepped its authority. But Senate President Steve Morris said sometimes legislators face unpleasant things.

"The court considers this part of their constitutional responsibility whether we agree with it or not, and we as legislators have taken an oath to uphold the constitution," said Morris, R-Hugoton. "I don't like it either, but we have to act responsibly."

Lawmakers in March upped the annual education budget by _$142 million to nearly _$2.9 billion. On June 3, the court said that wasn't good enough and ordered the Legislature to find another _$143 million for schools by the start of the new budget year July 1.

The court also left open the possibility of requiring lawmakers to come up with another _$568 million for schools in the budget year beginning July 1, 2006 -- an issue lawmakers will confront next year.

Legislators can raise taxes or cut state services, neither considered serious options. Some lawmakers aren't convinced that new, more optimistic state revenue estimates will live up to expectations.

That pretty much leaves expanded gambling as the only solution with any chance of success in the Senate.

Basically, two proposals are floating -- "Big Casino" and "Little Casino." Neither promises any money to the state until near the end of 2005, but that's still in time to provide extra school funding in the upcoming budget year.

"It's enough to deal with the current problem in school finance and maybe enough to squeak through the overall budget commitment in the next budget year," said Senate Majority Leader Derek Schmidt, R-Independence.

Big Casino calls for five "destination casinos" plus slot machines at pari-mutuel dog and horse tracks in Anthony, Eureka, Frontenac, Kansas City and Wichita. Little Casino also allows slots at the tracks, but limits casinos to Wyandotte County and southeast Kansas.

Doug Lawrence, a gambling industry lobbyist, said tracks and casinos would pay _$15,000 in upfront money for each slot machine. Assuming 5,500 slots at the tracks as envisioned by the proposals, the state could have an _$82.5 million windfall by the end of the year.

Casinos and tracks first must get approval in counties where voters already haven't endorsed such operations and then must work out a contract with the state.

"Once you have an agreement allowing the developer to go forward without additional steps, the accelerator payments would be due," Lawrence said. "On the track side, we would expect the accelerator within six months of passage of the bill."

Lawrence said each casino would have up to 2,000 slots, amounting to $30 million upfront money. He said the process of getting a casino running takes longer and the state wouldn't see upfront money until around next April.