Their lawsuit contends that the Ohio Constitution prohibits the state's effort to expand gambling.

Wednesday, January 16, 2002 from the Columbus Dispatch
Jon Craig
Dispatch Statehouse Reporter

Making good on their threat when the bill passed last year, a coalition of church and anti-gambling groups yesterday sued the state, aiming to block Ohio's plan to join a multistate lottery.

Led by the Ohio Roundtable, a conservative think tank, the groups said joining the Big Game or Powerball would violate the Ohio Constitution.

Roundtable President David P. Zanotti said existing law gives Gov. Bob Taft no authority to get involved in the lottery expansion so he'll ask a judge to approve an injunction to keep the law from taking effect.

Attorney General Betty D. Montgomery confirmed yesterday that she was not consulted when the General Assembly gave Taft the go- ahead to join a multistate lottery.

Montgomery said she spoke with an unnamed client about the same issue more than a year ago. She wouldn't disclose her informal advice.

"We are schizophrenic about gambling in Ohio,'' she said, referring to plans to expand the lottery while her office is trying to regulate charitable gambling, including bingo. "I have a general concern about the expansion.''

But Montgomery said she would put her personal opinions aside and give Taft "zealous representation'' in the court battle.

Taft spokesman Joe Andrews said, "It's our intention at this point to fight (the lawsuit).''

Mardele L. Cohen, spokeswoman for the Ohio Lottery Commission, said, "Our legal department feels we are legally within our bounds. It's not an expansion. It's the same game; it's just a different play-style.''

But Zanotti noted that a 1988 opinion by then-Attorney General Anthony J. Celebrezze Jr. said the Lottery Commission "has no authority to promulgate rules . . . authorizing the director to enter into agreements with other states for the operation of a joint lotto game.

"The scope of the Lottery Commission's authority is limited by the terms of the statute to the operation of a 'statewide' lottery.''

Celebrezze wrote that the Ohio Constitution provides for the commission to run only a lottery with the "entire net proceeds'' paid into the state treasury.

"I discern no basis upon which to imply the authority for the Lottery Commission to join other states in the operation of a lottery,'' the Democrat wrote.

Montgomery said it will be up to a court to decide whether Celebrezze's opinion stands today.

Senate President Richard H. Finan said legislators didn't ask Montgomery for an opinion because researching the issue is a difficult and time-consuming job.

The Cincinnati Republican said he thinks that the multistate proposal will withstand the lawsuit.

"This is just an extension of an existing lottery,'' he said. "I had a belief that the Lottery Commission could have done this anyway without legislative action. Clearly with legislative action, it's even more substantive.''

Finan thinks that the lawsuit's plaintiffs should be required to post bond because an injunction almost certainly will cost the state money. If the plaintiffs lose, they should be forced to reimburse the state, he said.

"If they grant an injunction, it will cost the state of Ohio significant revenue as of July 1. Somebody ought to be responsible for that. They (plaintiffs) don't have to balance the budget. We do,'' he said.

Taft signed the bill authorizing Ohio to join a multistate lottery to help plug a $1.5 billion hole in the current two-year state budget.

Joining a multistate lottery is projected to bring $41 million to the state during the next 18 months. The bill noted that the new money will go to the Education Department budget; however, an equal amount is then to be transferred from the department budget back to the general fund, meaning schools will get nothing from the expansion.

When the Ohio Constitution was amended in 1973 to allow a lottery, it required that all lottery profits must go to the Department of Education. Lottery profits make up about 6 percent of the department's budget.

Zanotti, who called himself an "anti-gambling zealot,'' said his group is planning a $50,000 to $100,000 advertising campaign pointing out the negative impacts of the lottery on gambling addicts and the economy. The ads would run on radio and cable television, he said.

Zanotti's organization, a conservative nonprofit group, helped defeat issues on 1990 and '96 ballots that would have brought riverboat casino gambling to Ohio.
"The Ohio Lottery will die if it does not expand,'' said the Rev. John Edgar, superintendent of the Columbus South District of the United Methodist Church, who joined the lawsuit on behalf of the Anti-Gambling Coalition. "Their bluff was a bunch of church folks would never take them to court.''

Dispatch Statehouse reporter Lee Leonard and the Associated Press contributed to this story.

Copyright © 2002, The Columbus Dispatch