LETTERS: COURT TO DECIDE GAMBLING ISSUES

To the editor:

On Wednesday, the Missouri Supreme Court will hear Akin vs. the Gaming Commission. This case challenges the constitutionality of the huge Maryland Heights casino complex. The outcome will have broad ramifications for our state.

The basis of the suit is that Missourians voted to amend our Constitution to restrict gambling to the Missouri and Mississippi rivers. The Harrahs, Players Island casino in Maryland Heights is a large casino complex with engineless gambling barges floating in manmade ponds many feet away from the river. The suit challenges the constitutionality of the gaming commission's passing this land-based complex as something that Missouri voters approved.

When Missouri citizens voted to approve riverboat gambling, there were to be excursions and a $500 maximum loss limit per excursion.

The idea of limiting gambling to riverboats with cruises and loss limits was used by the gambling industry to assuage the concerns of Missouri citizens when it came to the inherent dangers of legalized gambling. It was reasoned that restricting cruises to two hours and enforcing a loss limit would avoid the introduction of a high-pressure, Las Vegas-style casino industry.

With a conservative estimate of 100,000 compulsive gamblers residing in our state and new evidence of a correlation between the spread of legalized gambling and the recent surge of personal bankruptcy rates, it appears that Missourians were warranted in their apprehensions about legalized gambling.

Earlier this year, a new national study was released by SMR Research Corp. In a report intended for lending institutions, the 250-page report demonstrated that those counties where residents had access to more than one gambling facility were much more likely to have a significantly higher rate of bankruptcy. The 298 U.S. counties that have legalized gambling within their borders had a 1996 bankruptcy filing rate of 18 percent higher than in counties with no gambling. The bankruptcy rate was 35 percent higher than the average rate in counties with five or more gambling establishments. St. Louis experienced a 36 percent increase in filings for 1996.

Compulsive gambling is a progressive disorder recognized by the American Psychological Association. Those suffering from this affliction often go to great lengths to accommodate their addiction. In another survey, 56 percent of Gamblers Anonymous members surveyed in Illinois admitted to using illegal means to support their gambling, 44 percent admitted to stealing from work, and 66 percent admitted to contemplating suicide.

Restricting gambling to riverboats and imposing loss limits were safeguards promised to Missourians when they voted to limit gambling to the rivers. They were to help curb the destructive tendencies of gambling addiction. They are similar to the drunk-driving laws which are in place to protect society at large, not to prevent alcoholism. Similarly, the $500 loss limits and cruising requirements were intended to help protect Missourians from the social ills associated with legalized gambling.

The casinos are again expected to try to lift the cruise restrictions and the $500 maximum loss limits in the next legislative session. They argue that the laws are phony in the sense that they are not really operating excursion riverboats anymore. If allowed to do away with these restrictions, the casinos will have completed their bait and switch.

It is the gaming commission which licensed the land-based Maryland Heights facility under the guise of a riverboat which should be assailed, not the cruise requirements and loss limits promised to Missourians.

The Supreme Court will have an opportunity to uphold the intent of the constitutional amendment. If it does not, we should expect even more broken promises.

STEVEN TAYLOR, Director

Casino Watch

St. Louis