I watched the first hour or so of the Racing Commission meeting today after the video feed started late with the meeting already in progress.
The proposed changes were unanimously adopted. The next step is approval by the Arkansas Legislative Council.
As expected, there wasn’t anything specific discussed on Pope County or Legends. Interestingly, though, when each of the existing casinos’ representatives spoke, their focus and the interest of the commissioners was on things like the number of employees, where the employees were from—mostly local—and how they are contributing to their communities.
The bulk of 800 written comments from individuals were against sports wagering off-site. Another 800 or so comments were collected and submitted by a lobbyist for national online gaming interests.
Several people spoke during the public comment period. First up was John Burris of Capitol Advisors Group, representing existing online sports betting interests.
Legends won’t be able to participate until their casino resort is open for business. The new rules state, “In order to operate an online sports pool, a casino licensee must first operate and continue to operate a sports pool from the casino licensee’s premises.”