ny pml sec 109 belongs in hell with those of the buffalo billions
working is a alternative to betting for some?
nyc otb rests in peace
Claude Solnik
Long Island Business News
2150 Smithtown Ave.
Ronkonkoma, NY 11779-7348
Home > LI Confidential > Stop scratching on holidays
Stop scratching on holidays
Published: June 1, 2012
Off Track Betting in New York State has been racing into a crisis called shrinking revenue. Some people have spitballed a solution: Don’t close on holidays.
New York State Racing Law bars racing on Christmas, Easter and Palm Sunday, and the state has ruled OTBs can’t handle action on those days, even though they could easily broadcast races from out of state.
“You should be able to bet whenever you want,” said Jackson Leeds, a Nassau OTB employee who makes an occasional bet. He added some irrefutable logic: “How is the business going to make money if you’re not open to take people’s bets?”
Elias Tsekerides, president of the Federation of Hellenic Societies of Greater New York, said OTB is open on Greek Orthodox Easter and Palm Sunday.
“I don’t want discrimination,” Tsekerides said. “They close for the Catholics, but open for the Greek Orthodox? It’s either open for all or not open.”
OTB officials have said they lose millions by closing on Palm Sunday alone, with tracks such as Gulfstream, Santa Anita, Turf Paradise and Hawthorne running.
One option: OTBs could just stay open and face the consequences. New York City OTB did just that back in 2003. The handle was about $1.5 million – and OTB was fined $5,000.
Easy money.
State gaming officials considering whether to let New York's casinos offer online sports wagering
Sports bets like this one being placed at the Meadowlands Racetrack in New Jersey may still become possible in New York. (Julio Cortez / AP)
New York casinos may still get the chance to offer online sports wagering — even though the state Legislature failed to pass legislation officially authorizing it.
State gaming officials are currently working on regulations that would allow New York’s four commercial casinos to take sports bets and are examining the “thorny” issue of whether mobile platforms could be allowed under existing law, Ron Ochrym, acting executive director of the state Gaming Commission, said Monday.
“Commission staff continues to work on regulations that would effectuate sports gambling under existing statutory language,” Ochrym said at the commission’s monthly meeting, adding that the one issue being reviewed is whether “existing law can be read so as to authorize mobile wagering without new statutory enactments.”
Under New York’s 2013 gaming law, the state’s four commercial casinos were allowed to offer on-site sports gambling once a federal ban on it was lifted and the Gaming Commission drafted regulations to govern the betting operations. The law states that “an operator shall accept wagers on sports events only from persons physically present in the sports wagering lounge.”
After the Supreme Court struck down the federal ban this spring, state lawmakers considered – but failed to adopt — legislation that would have allowed the casinos to offer online platforms and betting kiosks at racetracks and other venues.
Assembly Racing and Wagering Committee Chairman Gary Pretlow (D-Westchester County), who sponsored the online sports gambling legislation, said he believes the Gaming Commission had the power to authorize online gambling.
“The Gaming Commission has the authority to interpret the laws as they see fit,” Pretlow said.
Ochrym said commission staff planned to meet with stakeholders in the industry to discuss the matter but did not offer a timetable on when the new regulations would be completed and released for public review.
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