The Florida House and Senate failed to reach an agreement on a sweeping reform of the state’s gambling industry, Sen. Bill Galvano, one of the leading negotiators, announced on Tuesday.
The two houses of Florida’s Legislature presented earlier this year two completely different bills. The Senate’s legislative piece called for massive gambling expansion in the state that would have included the addition of slot machines in eight counties and would have allowed the Seminole Tribe to offer craps and roulette at its casinos in exchange for $3 billion for a seven-year period.
The House bill, on the other hand, would have maintained the current gambling status quo in the state. In other words, the Seminoles would have been allowed to continue offering blackjack in exchange for the same amount of $3 billion over the first seven years and no slot machines would have been added at eight counties where voters had previously approved the measure.
Florida lawmakers revealed on Tuesday that slot machines actually turned into that one major obstacle that obstructed the success of the negotiations.
Residents of eight Florida counties had previously voted in favor of the addition of slot machines at pari-mutuel facilities. While the Senate was keen on an expansion of this type, the House approached the matter more conservatively. As a result, the Florida Legislature is about to complete one more legislative session without striking a gambling deal.
The state Senate tried to resolve the slot machines issue before a pending ruling of the Florida Supreme Court. The state’s highest court is expected to decide on whether counties can add slots without having to get the nod from the Legislature.
At present, casino-style gambling expansion is illegal in the state. Slot machines are considered casino-style gambling options that are only legal in the Broward and Miami-Dade counties as well as in Seminole casinos in South Florida.
With gambling negotiations now being in the past, the Legislature failed to reach an agreement on the tribal gambling issue for another year.
Under a 2010 compact with the Seminole Tribe, the latter was allowed to operate blackjack tables exclusively within the state’s borders for a five-year period. That particular provision of the 30-year compact expired in the summer of 2015, but the Seminoles kept their blackjack tables, arguing that the state has violated their exclusivity agreement by allowing pari-mutuels to offer table games that were very much like blackjack.
A federal judge sided last year with the tribe. The state appealed the ruling and a decision on the matter is yet to be announced.
Seminole officials indicated that they would not negotiate any of the two legislative proposals, as both the House and the Senate had presented the tribe with offers that would have required it to pay $3 billion but it would have not received very much in exchange.
With gambling negotiations dead for another session, it is now up to the tribe whether it would make any payments to the state or decide to keep its gambling revenue for its own coffers only. With that said, another legislative session is approaching its end, leaving too many gambling questions unanswered.
