Check out this notation from the agenda for the upcoming Sioux Falls City Council Agenda for August 20th, including the results of the legislative items that the Sioux Falls City Council voted on this past week to encourage the South Dakota State Legislature to pass during the 2020 Legislative Session:
Sioux Falls City Councilors Patrick Starr and Theresa Stehly are pushing hard to get the Sioux Falls City Council to get behind more than doubling the number of Video Lottery machines that each establishment can have in one location from 10 to 25. The only councilor they could get to join them in their quest in passing legislation to more than double the number in gambling locations was Councilor Janet Brekke.
It was voted down hard by the rest of the councilors. But where’s the hue and cry for an expansion of gaming in this manner in the first place? Possibly but for a few casino owners, I can’t say I’m hearing anyone demanding that many more video lottery machines in convenience stores and restaurants across the state.
What say you?
Huh. What were their assertions in support of this measure? That would be part of the story.
It has to do with the state requirement that there be at least one employee per video lottery establishment (defined as 10 machines). Some casinos outside Sioux Falls have played fast and loose with this requirement through creative architecture, joining multiple supposedly separate video lottery establishments under a single roof, thereby requiring less labor than state statute requires.
As I understand it, the proposal was made to reduce overhead costs for video lottery establishment operators and, in effect, get closer to making legal what is already happening in some establishments around the state.
Pat Starr sometimes likes to make motions like this to try to prove a point. There was an ordinance discussion earlier in the evening that would allow two casinos that are right next to each other with a shared interior door and shared refrigeration. He saw it as an attempt to circumvent “10 machine per casino” limit, so he tried to add this to the city council legislative agenda to try to point of a perceived hypocrisy among other councilors that said they weren’t for expanding the “10 casino limit” but were also in favor of the ordinance that casino operators had asked for. The concern is that it’s not safe for casino employees to constantly going back and forth from each casino outside (especially with money), so they asked to be able to have an interior door between the two and a shared refrigerator for cost savings. Seems like a reasonable request, especially compared to what some cities do where there’s no boundary at all between two “separate” 10-slot casinos.
If they don’t like the partition law, more clearly defining that would seem far more reasonable than doubling the number of machines allowed in South Dakota.
Thanks for the clarification Matt Paulson.
Please forgive me Dear Republican friends but this is:
Fake News
Pat Powers…please watch how the video lottery vote goes next week.
Then please be fair and report the facts.
I’ve had high ranking Republican leaders tell me that they can’t figure out why you hate me so much.
Theresa, that vote seems to be in black-and-white. Just because you don’t like to see your vote to expand gambling in writing does not mean that it is not a fact.
SoDakCampaign: “that vote seems to be in black-and-white” . . . . to someone who apparently can’t or won’t consider context and mitigating facts. Plus the detail that this was an action proposed by the legislative body of and to one municipality, not the entire state.
JD seriously? What do you think their legislative package is? They as a body are voting to pass a resolution asking the state to pass legislation to do these things.
When Theresa and Pat introduce resolutions to more than double the numbers of machines, it isn’t asking to change any partitions. Any business owner with half a brain is just going to double the number of machines on either side of the partition.
And these resolutions clearly and unequivocally represent a huge expansion to video lottery in the state.
Oops. My bad. You win on my legislative package oversight. Oh, well. You know what they say: to mix up mayo, you gotta break some eggs.