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By Dan Genz
Capital News Service
Thursday, March 27, 2003

ANNAPOLIS - The pro-slots Senate will throw down its gauntlet at the gaming-shy House today, when it votes on a budget proposal tying slot machine approval to the end of the legislative session.

The Senate's bold move would halt any fix to Maryland's $2 billion deficit from going into effect until the House approves the Senate's slots plan, or the Senate relents.

Because the General Assembly must pass the budget before adjourning, the tie-in could lock lawmakers into negotiations beyond the scheduled April 7 close of the session.

Senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller Jr., D-Calvert, called connecting slots to the state's budget "everything I can do," to pass slots.

Leading slots opponent House Speaker Michael Busch criticized the Senate slots plan as a monopoly-granting bill that could ruin the state and outlined what he called a better way to institute slots.

The Senate's plan places 3,500 slot machines at Laurel, Pimlico and Rosecroft race tracks, with another 1,000 machines planned for a track under construction in Cumberland. It divides the projected annual $1.5 billion profits five ways with 46 percent funding education spending increases, 39 percent going to the tracks, and the rest split among the equine industry, lottery commission and jurisdictions with slots parlors.

Passing the bill 25-21 last week, "is the only thing we've done to address our fiscal situation," said Budget and Taxation Vice Chairman Patrick J. Hogan, D-Montgomery, reminding his peers of billion-dollar deficits awaiting Maryland in future years.

Education reforms must be funded, Miller said, so slots must be part of the budget. If no alternative is passed or slots are delayed, education funding would have to wait three years, he said.

While Sen. Paul Pinsky, D-Prince George's, and other senators who fought the bill, view the budget proposal vote as a chance to "put the stake in the plan," most legislators expect the binding language to pass intact.

"(Miller) has the votes for all of it," said Sen. Minority Leader J. Lowell Stoltzfus, R-Somerset, a slots opponent who also has problems with some of the taxes in the budget.

With the Senate vote today, Miller said he will hand the responsibility for legalizing slot machines back to Gov. Robert Ehrlich, who campaigned on slots approval.

Taking up Miller's lobbying challenge, Ehrlich will meet with Busch for a long breakfast this morning.

"It is the last chance" to make something happen, Busch said during a chat with reporters where he advocated a major tax increase and mapped out what he called a better slot machine plan.

Under the Senate plan, Magna Entertainment, which owns both Pimlico and Laurel could install 7,000 of the state's 11,500 slot machines.

The Senate gives Magna a "monopoly," Busch said, adding he fears there is nothing stopping the company from pushing future legislators to expand slots to off-track betting facilities throughout Maryland and "creating a monster."
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The ideal plan would put a smaller number of machines at about five or six locations, Busch said, all owned separately to promote competition.

Ocean Downs and the State Fair Grounds in Timonium are the perfect race tracks to help the state profit from slots, he said, questioning why they weren't included in plans proposed by either Ehrlich or the Senate.

Last month, Ehrlich said he would consider installing the machines in Timonium, but that slots at Ocean Downs were off the table because they would hurt Ocean City's tourism industry.

The Senate plan would pass in the House now, Ehrlich said, if Busch allowed the lawmakers to vote them "up or down."

Busch rejects that contention and twice cancelled hearings on the Senate bill, saying lobbyists and the press would put too much pressure on the committee to pass slots.

He has already picked his conference committee to negotiate with the Senate's plan and said there is no reason for an extended session, because "We balanced the budget."   

Copyright © 2003 University of Maryland Philip Merrill College of Journalism