Illinois Lawmakers, don't marry the pig

Illinois Lawmakers, don't marry the pig

Almost 15 years ago, the state's attorney in Peoria County began speaking publicly about patterns of theft linked to the East Peoria riverboat casino. With regular succession, the faces of Girl Scout troop leaders, trusted school secretaries and local librarians appeared alongside armed robbers and drug dealers in the newspaper's crime section. Suffering from gambling addiction, the educated, white-collar crowd began stealing to support their bad habits.

Back then, riverboats were relatively new tools designed to spur economic development in blighted communities. They were, in fact, riverboats - attractive, multistory vessels that cruised Illinois waterways with paddle wheels and old-fashioned trimmings. Patrons could sip cocktails on the ship deck, visit the captain or spin the roulette wheel.

The revenue generated helped beautify downtown areas while offering depleted tourism coffers a booster shot.

That all changed.

Just as anti-gambling groups predicted in the early 1990s, casino operators have continued to push for less regulation and more saturation. Riverboats no longer churn along Illinois waterways; land-based casinos were more profitable because gamblers could walk aboard anytime. So out went the prerequisite for water.

Investment in the local community is no longer the "sell."

Rather, the state needs the money to pay its bills. Gambling is an easier political "sell" than increasing taxes. And so, like gerbils in an exercise wheel, lawmakers once again are building a top-heavy, something-for-everyone gambling bill that is sure to fizzle under its enormity.

The bill lawmakers are considering for next week's veto session includes four new casinos, slots at racetracks and the possibility of a casino in Chicago. There are a few new adornments this year, including slot machines at Chicago's two airports, but the pig hasn't morphed into anything other than an older, fatter pig. She's been down this road before.

For the most part, social arguments against expanded gambling don't resonate as they once did. The gambling addicts - the librarians, secretaries and reverends - no longer make the front page when they're caught stealing from kids and old people. Lawmakers, instead, are focused on the financial carrot to the state when wrestling with how to vote on an expanded gambling proposal.

Bottom line, it's wrong.

Setting aside the social arguments, state government should not increase its reliance on gamblers' losses in order to fund schools, prisons and health care for the poor - the state's three biggest financial strains.

It's quite absurd, actually, that the basic debate over government funding gets lost in the politics of how many gaming positions would be suitable and which towns should play host and what do the racetrack owners want this time around?

What about what we want from our government?

Hundreds of communities statewide expressed their distaste for expanding gambling by proactively banning the very video gambling machines that lawmakers approved in 2009. Mayors, citizen groups, church organizations and taxpayers sent a message to their local officials: We don't want more gambling.

And yet, lawmakers in Springfield - apparently oblivious to the message - unveiled a proposal for the biggest expansion of gambling this state has seen in 20 years.

The state needs revenue, no question. Even with the surgical spending cuts that groups such as the Civic Federation and others have outlined, state government is too far down the hole and only digging deeper.

We need some form of a tax increase. That is, after all, how we fund government in a civilized society, not by turning Illinois into Las Vegas.

Just in the past few days, the General Assembly has shown an appetite for fiscal sensibility in re-examining the state's Medicaid program and workers compensation laws. The effort to reform two outdated, inefficient, cost-laden systems started in the state Senate and spread to the House.

That's the right path to take. More, please.

Marrying the pig? Wrong.