Without Proper Regulation by Legislators, Charitable Bingo Can Be Turned into Big Business in Arkansas
Arkansas legislators should make strict regulations regarding bingo so commercial bingo operators do not take advantage of the bingo amendment and take an unacceptable portion of the proceeds away from the non profit organizations.
November 7, 2006, about 69% percent of the voters in the Midterm Elections in Arkansas voted for the approval of the amendment I, which clearly states that “A Constitutional Amendment providing that bingo and raffles, if conducted by authorized organizations (defined as nonprofit religious, educational, veterans, fraternal, service, civic, medical, volunteer rescue, volunteer fire, and volunteer police organizations), shall not be constitutionally prohibited as a lottery, provided the organization has been in existence five (5) years and net receipts are used only for charitable, religious, or philanthropic purposes.” It is pretty understandable that the intent of the bill and by the Arkansas voters is to allow non-profit organizations in their state to have the means to raise the funds that they need using bingo and raffle games. They do not see the harm that such gaming activities can bring in the state because usually there is no problem.
The problem develops when shrewd operators exploit loopholes in the amendment so that they can earn profits for themselves instead of the charities that the law intends to earn from this bingo games. That is one of the reasons why state legislators must be watchful regarding this potential problem. One of the main holes that lawmakers could immediately fix is this line “all net receipts over and above the actual cost of operating the bingo or raffle games can only be used for charitable, religious and philanthropic activities”.
The line that “no receipts can be used to compensate an individual in any way especially if he has a connection with an authorize bingo and raffle group”. The whole amendment sounds pretty specific but if you would really examine it, there is nothing in the amendment that prohibits Bingo operators from personally taking part in the games. They could just operate the Bingo games by themselves. The commercial bingo operator’’s part of the proceeds could just be part of actual operating cost of conducting the game and can be considered legal.
The non-profit organization could be left of with little to none in terms of monetary compensation. Non-profit organizations do not need to run the games and they just receive the check on their share. These kinds of operators have already taken advantage of these kinds of “holes” in some of the laws in the United States. They will surely take advantage if they even see a single defect in the Amendment I in Arkansas.
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Filed by ezcraps at April 5th, 2007 under Uncategorized
