A bill that would allow the Kentucky Lottery Corp. to implement a shared lottery game based on the results of live horse racing passed through the Kentucky Senate 22-9 on February 13.[i] Senate Bill 74, sponsored by Louisville Republican Julie Raque Adams, moved on to the House where it was posted in Committee but did not move forward.[ii
The bill, which builds off KRS 154A.065, “spells out integration between lottery terminals and racing pools that is the basis for a game like Equilottery.”[iii] The Equilottery game, which was developed by former GOP chairman Brad Cummings, allows lottery players to purchase a two-dollar ticket from a Kentucky lottery terminal on a live horse race.[iv] The two dollars would be split between a lottery game and the horse race, with the chance of winning both.[v] For example, if an EquiLottery player purchases a trifecta ticket that reads 3-5-8 and the horses come home in that order then the player would win a portion of the EquiLottery pool, split among winning EquiLottery players, and also would win the trifecta paid out by the racetrack.[vi]
The goals of EquiLottery are to boost horseplayer payouts through increases in handle, improve the overall racing product, and provide an innovative new product for the lottery industry.[vii] Revenue forecasts performed by Gaming Laboratories International for the first year of implementation have shown EquiLottery will perform around three-to-four percent of the Kentucky Lottery’s annual revenue, which was more than $850 million in 2014.[viii] That would equate to approximately $25-30 million in revenue. Cummings, a co-founder of the horse industry news site The Paulick Report, said with those numbers that his company would hope to take in between $250,000 and $500,000.[ix]
The EquiLottery bill, which passed unanimously through the Senate Licensing, Occupations, and Administrative Regulations Committee, has received strong support from both sides of the aisle.[x] The bill also has gotten strong support from many industry groups. Officials with the Kentucky Thoroughbred Association, Kentucky Horsemen’s Benevolent and Protective Association, and the Thoroughbred Owners and Breeders Association have told lawmakers their organizations support the concept.[xi]
By: Travers Manley, Staff Member
[i] EquiLottery Bill Passes Kentucky Senate by Wide Margin, EquiLottery (Feb. 13, 2015), http://www.equilottery.com/articles/%E2%80%9Cequilottery-bill%E2%80%9D-passes-kentucky-senate-by-wide-margin.html.
[ii] Greg Hall, EquiLottery Bill Clears Senate After Hiccup, The Courier-Journal (Feb. 13, 2015), http://www.courier-journal.com/story/horse-biz/2015/02/13/equilottery-bill-clears-senate-after-hiccup/23357687/.
[iii] EquiLottery Bill Passes Kentucky Senate by Wide Margin, supra note 1.
[iv] Let’s Get Right to It. How does EquiLottery Work?, EquiLottery, http://www.equilottery.com/how-it-works.html (last visited Feb. 25, 2015).
[v] Greg Hall, Panel Gives Lottery-Racing Bet Unanimous OK, The Courier-Journal (Feb. 10, 2015), http://www.courier-journal.com/story/horse-biz/2015/02/10/panel-gives-lottery-racing-bet-unanimous-ok/23171101/.
[vi] Let’s Get Right to It. How does EquiLottery Work?, supra note 4.
[vii] EquiLottery, http://www.equilottery.com/ (last visited Feb. 25, 2015).
[viii] Revenue Forecasts, EquiLottery, http://www.equilottery.com/media-kit.html#studies (last visited Feb. 25, 2015).
[ix] Hall, supra note 5.
[x] Kentucky Senate Committee Unanimously Passes SB74, EquiLottery (Feb. 10, 2015), http://www.equilottery.com/articles/kentucky-senate-committee-unanimously-passes-sb74.html.
[xi] Kentucky Senate Approves EquiLottery Bill, Blood-Horse (Feb. 13, 2015), http://www.bloodhorse.com/horse-racing/articles/90074/equilottery-bill-clears-ky-senate-committee.