Skip navigation



Facts



FACT SHEET: ROMNEY’S PROPOSED FY2005 BUDGET – PENNY WISE OR POUND FOOLISH?

“An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure”

PROBLEM GAMBLING FUNDING

  • In Governor Romney‘s proposed 2005 fiscal year budget, he has removed funding for problem gambling services. The line item is listed as “program discontinued” with $0 allocated. We seek your support for restoring funding to this line item – 4512-0225.
  • Problem gambling services are NOT funded by tax dollars. Since 1987, legislation has required that a portion of the Lottery’s unclaimed winnings be allocated to provide education, intervention and treatment services related to problem gambling. This funding, which is not from the General Fund, helps problem gamblers and their families and is less than one-tenth of one percent of total gambling revenues.
  • During fiscal year 2002, the Legislature approved a $1 million budget increase for a total of $2 million dedicated to addressing gambling problems in Massachusetts. In July 2002, Governor Swift reduced that amount by $1 million and in October 2002 reduced that by another $345,000, leaving $655,000 for statewide problem gambling services. Now, Governor Romney is proposing $0.

MASS. COUNCIL AND THE LOTTERY

  • The Commonwealth sponsors one of the most successful Lotteries in the nation. The Lottery has grossed nearly $4 billion annually and is set to meet that benchmark again even in our down economy.
  • Despite concerns about the Lottery’s impact on the Commonwealth’s most vulnerable citizens that led to an advertising ban in 1998, $5 million has been restored to the Lottery for advertising this year.
  • State Treasurer, Timothy Cahill and Lottery Director, Joseph Sullivan support funding the Mass. Council as a means for providing for the unintended negative consequences of the state-sponsored Lottery. Their request to the Administration for this was $1 million for FY05.
  • For 21 years, the Mass. Council has ensured that the state, which operates gambling, takes responsibility for the downside. Its leaders have understood that providing a safety net for those harmed by its business is a cost of operation.

MASS. COUNCIL MISSION

  • Since it’s founding in 1983, the Massachusetts Council on Compulsive Gambling has been dedicated to promoting responsible public policy on gambling.
  • The Mass. Council on Compulsive Gambling is not pro or anti-gambling. The organization realizes that most people gamble for entertainment and for fun and do so with minimal disruption to their lives. However, they also realize that there are those for whom gambling becomes extremely problematic with devastating emotional and financial consequences.
  • The Mass. Council believes that a state, which sponsors, endorses, and promotes gambling needs to take responsibility for the problems related to that gambling.
  • While the Massachusetts Council on Compulsive Gambling does not take a prohibitionist stance toward gambling, it encourages responsible public policy toward gambling that supports problem gambling specific research, prevention, education, and treatment.
  • The Mass. Council on Compulsive Gambling operates a confidential toll-free Helpline 24-hours a day, 7-days a week. Problem gamblers, their loved ones and professionals call every day seeking referrals for help and information.

PROBLEM GAMBLING IN THE COMMONWEALTH / FINANCIAL IMPLICATIONS

  • Compulsive gambling is a disorder characterized by an overwhelming, uncontrollable obsession to gamble. Clinically defined as pathological gambling by the American Psychiatric Association, it is listed in the fourth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-IV) as an impulse control disorder.
  • Approximately 6% of the adult general population has had some significant, adverse effect from gambling in their lifetimes. About 4% (or nearly 250,000 Massachusetts residents) has had a gambling problem within the past year.
  • Spouses, children, relatives and friends of compulsive gamblers can suffer financial, emotional and even physical harm. The adverse effects are often devastating for loved ones of problem gamblers.
  • As plans for increasing gambling in Massachusetts develop, eliminating funding of the only voice urging responsible public policy and providing help for problem gamblers is shortsighted and disturbing.
  • Without funding for problem gambling services, the cities and the towns of Massachusetts will shoulder the costs in human services agencies serving the homeless, seniors, children, handicapped, victims of domestic violence, and those struggling with substance abuse and other mental health disorders; the costs of gambling are felt in school systems and colleges; the costs of gambling are felt in the criminal justice system and in the welfare and unemployment offices. Certainly funding to address disordered gambling and its social impact is “the right thing to do”. However, it also is a fiscally responsible choice as well; failing to address problem gambling issues will cost the state in the long run.

PROBLEM GAMBLING NATIONALLY

  • Nationally, it is estimated that problem gambling costs society at least $5 billion a year in healthcare and social services.
  • Gambling problems in the workplace result in lower productivity, absenteeism, and theft.
  • A survey of Gamblers Anonymous members found that 47% had engaged in insurance fraud or thefts. For further evidence, the Mass. Council encourages people to read the police logs of their local newspapers.
  • Problem Gambling is not good for families. Divorces, abuse, suicide and bankruptcy are often symptoms of problem gambling.