By Bryan Corbin, Evansville Courier & Press
INDIANAPOLIS - A bill inspired in part by the forthcoming sale of Casino Aztar in Evansville has just passed in the state Senate.
Senators approved House Bill 1224 by a vote of 45 to 2, sending the bill back to the Indiana House for conference-committee negotiations.
Authored by state Rep. Trent Van Haaften, D-Mount Vernon, and co-sponsored by Sen. Vaneta Becker, R-Evansville, the bill designates who would operate a riverboat if the casino owner lost its gaming license, filed for bankruptcy or abandoned the gambling facility.
Casino Aztar was recently put up for sale when its owner, Columbia Sussex Corp., sought to avoid bankruptcy after New Jersey gaming regulators revoked Columbia's gaming license in that state. New Jersey has appointed a conservator to operate Columbia's Tropicana casino resort in Atlantic City, N.J., temporarily during the transition. But Indiana currently has no such provision for naming an interim casino operator if a riverboat finds itself without an owner.
House Bill 1224 says that the Indiana Gaming Commission will appoint a trustee who would operate a riverboat temporarily until a new gaming licenseholder could be approved.
The bill also contains separate wording, preventing the Indiana Gaming Commission and Horse Racing Commission from charging unspecified fees when a casino owner or race track owner sells its gambling facility. That legislation was motivated by the $9 million fee that the Gaming Commission charged a former owner of the Indiana Downs horse track in Shelbyville, Ind., when it sold its share last year. Lawmakers have complained that the commission had no legal authority to impose a "transfer tax," but the bill does not require the state to refund the $9 million fee to the former horse track owner.
Voting yes on House Bill 1224 were senators Becker, Bob Deig, D-Mount Vernon, Lindel Hume, D-Princeton, John Waterman, R-Shelburn, and Richard Young, D-Milltown.
Today, the Senate also has passed House Bill 1153, which allows bars, taverns and restaurants to offer small-stakes paper gambling, such as pull-tabs, punch boards and tip boards.
Nonprofit fraternal organizations, such as American Legion halls and VFW posts, already can offer paper gambling. But for-profit bar and tavern owners wanted parity, contending they needed to offer such games to remain competitive.
The paper-gambling bill passed with a bare majority of 26-21 and now goes back to the House. Deig, Hume, Waterman and Young all voted yes on House Bill 1153. Becker voted no.