Gambling on a sure thing
Over its 25 years, Arizona Lottery has enriched state with revenues way beyond expectations
Amanda J. Crawford
The Arizona Republic
Jul. 16, 2006 12:00 AM
It was created in 1981, backed by businessmen looking for a tax break.
Twenty-five years later, the Arizona Lottery has made hundreds of people millionaires while awarding $2.9 billion in prizes. It has contributed more than $1.8 billion to state and local projects and programs, far surpassing the annual revenue hopes of that original group of businessmen. From new roads and bus shelters to programs for neglected children and funding for state parks, lottery dollars have touched the lives of nearly all Arizonans.
And despite fears that the lottery would draw "undesirables" to the state, criminal influence and corruption charges have not materialized. Today, with Indian casinos, online gambling and lotteries in almost every other state, the gambling landscape has drastically changed.
Yet Arizonans lured by the prospect of easy wealth continue to plunk down a buck or more for a chance to realize their dreams. Thousands of everyday folks with visions of Porsches and mansions and early retirement dancing in their heads play every week against almost impossible odds, spending about $400 million a year on tickets.
Though most players have spent way more money on the lottery than they have collected, a lucky 398 players have won a million dollars or more. There have been machinists and casino workers, short-order cooks and postal workers, laborers and retirees. They've financed their children's college educations or their own retirements, lost everything in bad investments or spent their way back to where they were before winning.
Some have saved the winnings and kept their lives about the same, while others have up and disappeared, hiding away from the scammers and the long-lost relatives and greedy friends who, winners say, come calling immediately.
Still, even those who have done the almost impossible and won continue to hold out hope that they can do it again. As Shefik Tallmadge, one jackpot winner who lost it all, explains: "If you don't have hope in life, what is the point?"
Arizona was the first state west of the Mississippi to sponsor a lottery. Though lotteries are now in 42 states, only 14 had lotteries then and the 1980 initiative campaign to create the lottery was steeped in controversy.
It was backed by businessmen who hoped the lottery could raise a revenue stream of $40 million a year and lead to tax reductions. It was funded by a lottery ticket manufacturer who then landed the first ticket contract.
'Shabby and lowdown'
There was widespread concern that a lottery would draw organized crime and lead impoverished residents to gamble away their hard-earned cash. Gov. Bruce Babbitt, one of the leading opponents, predicted that a lottery would make Arizona "shabby and lowdown."
Still, voters narrowly approved the lottery, with 51 percent in favor of it. When the Scratchers tickets went on sale after midnight on July 1, 1981, some stores sold out in minutes. Within 10 days, 21.4 million tickets were sold.
Since then, the lottery has generated revenue of more than $5.5 billion, a little more than half of which goes to prizes and about one-third to fund a variety of state and local projects and programs.
Unclaimed prizes fund the entire budget for the state's Court Appointed Special Advocates, or CASA, program, which provides volunteers to work with abused and neglected children in state custody. The state's General Fund gets a big chunk, more than $37 million a year.
And the Heritage Fund, which supports the Arizona Game and Fish and State Parks departments, gets $20 million each year. With deep cuts in parks funding in recent years, the Heritage Fund has played a critical role in supporting the department, said public information officer Ellen Bilbrey. For example, lottery money paid for about one-fourth of the cost to develop Kartchner Caverns State Park near Benson.
"There are so many things in the state that just wouldn't have happened if it hadn't been for the Heritage Fund and those lottery dollars," said Sandy Bahr of the Grand Canyon chapter of the Sierra Club.
Some concerns linger
But while state lotteries are now common and Indian gaming has brought a new dimension to gambling to Arizona, some groups, such as the conservative Center for Arizona Policy, continue to question the role of the state in enticing people to gamble on all but delusional hopes of winning big.
They point out that the odds of winning the jackpot are incredibly steep, 1 in 4.5 million for the Pick and 1 in 146 million for the multistate Powerball jackpot.
"We don't want people to be using the lottery as an investment because it is throwing away your money," said Peter Gentala, the center's general counsel.
He points to studies indicating that mostly low-income residents play lotteries.
Art Macias, the lottery's director, disputes that assertion and says the lottery's own research indicates that players mirror average Arizonans.
And, he says, the lottery supports the state's Office of Problem Gambling with $300,000 a year. |
