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NEWS
W.Va. Lottery sales down for the first time in 20 years
CHARLESTON -- With slot casinos in neighboring Pennsylvania luring gamblers away from its racetrack video machines, the West Virginia Lottery saw sales dip for only the second time in its history during the just-concluded budget year.
Gas prices may also help explain the estimated $1.53 billion in sales for the fiscal year that ended June 30, which is about 2 percent less than the previous year's total.
However slight, it marks the first downturn since 1988 for the Lottery, which sold its first ticket in 1986. But revenues transferred for state agencies and programs actually increased by $12 million to $618 million, thanks partly to the Lottery's newest offering: casino table games.
"West Virginia is still holding its own," Lottery spokeswoman Nancy Bulla said Wednesday.
The tracks drew in around $900 million, a drop of more than 7 percent. The decline was somewhat offset by increased sales of traditional lottery games and by the video lottery machines found in bars and clubs statewide.
The instant and online games brought in $199 million, up $7 million, while the video poker parlor activity grew by nearly 4 percent to just under $412 million.
The Lottery also reaped $15.8 million from the casino-style table games meant to help the tracks withstand competition. The proceeds from poker, craps and the like accounted for $7 million of the revenues transferred to the state.
Lottery officials note that table games debuted late in the fiscal year, and only at two of the four tracks.
The figures come on the heels of a Rockefeller Institute of Government report that found gambling-related revenue nationwide at an all-time high but cooling. That study ranked West Virginia behind only the gambling mecca of Nevada in the share of its state budget that comes from such revenues.
Bulla said the Mountain State has also avoided the confidence-shaking allegations involving outdated scratch-off tickets that have roiled the lottery in neighboring Virginia and elsewhere.
A growing number of lawsuits allege these lotteries continue to sell tickets offering an array of prizes even when the top prizes have been won.
"Director (John) Musgrave, several years ago, recognized the potential problem," she said. "We don't do that, and for some time our players have known we don't do that."
The figures also show that tables games have come in the nick of time for West Virginia's two Northern Panhandle tracks, Wheeling Island Racetrack and Gaming Center and Mountaineer Racetrack and Gaming Resort in Chester. Competing with seven slot machine venues that Pennsylvania has opened since late 2006, they account for nearly all the decline in racetrack video lottery sales.
The $15.8 million in revenues reflects just 38 weeks of table games action. Musgrave told legislators last month that the games have helped slot play rebound by greater-than-expected margins.
Tri-State Racetrack and Gaming Center in Cross Lanes, which been won approval for the games but not yet offered them, saw only a slight decline in revenue. And while Jefferson County voters rejected table games for Charles Town Races and Slots, initial figures suggest it may have seen a slight uptick in revenues.
"It's not affected by the competition from Pennsylvania quite so much," Bulla said.
Bulla also noted that the majority of gamblers at all four tracks hail from out of state, indicating that rising fuel costs may have played a lesser role.
