WHAT: Gambling addiction and impacts
experts to testify before the House SB152 Community Impacts
subcommittee
WHEN: Thursday, April 25, starting at
10:00 am
WHERE: LOB Room 208, Concord, NH
- 10:00 Mell Brooks, former
owner of an Oregon video slot machine parlor, resident of Littleton,
NH
- 10:30 Dr. Rachel
Volberg, world's leading academic researcher on gambling and gambling
machine addiction (via live teleconference before the committee)
- 1:00 Steve Norton, NH
Center for Public Policy Research, lead researcher for NH Gaming
Study Commission
- 2:00 (pending) Dr. Robert
Breen, academic researcher on gambling addiction and relative
addictiveness of various forms of gambling and longtime director of the Rhode
Island Gambling Treatment Program (via live teleconference)
Some supporters of SB152 have claimed
that video slot machines are no more addictive than existing forms of gambling
in New Hampshire, or that the presence in or close proximity of video slot
machine casinos to New Hampshire communities will not increase existing rates of
gambling addiction and problem gambling among New Hampshire residents. These
leading experts will provide the most accurate and most current information
relative to these assertions to the House subcommittee charged with finding the
facts relative to casino community impacts.
Dr. Rachel A.
Volberg, President
of Gemini Research, is widely regarded as the most experienced problem gambling
epidemiologist in the world. Dr. Volberg has been involved in research on
gambling and problem gambling since 1985. In North America, Dr. Volberg has
directed baseline and replication prevalence surveys among adults in more than
25 states and provinces. In addition to sub-national studies in the United
States, Canada and Australia, Dr. Volberg has directed or consulted on national
problem gambling prevalence surveys in Britain, New Zealand, Norway, Sweden and
the United States. Dr. Volberg sits on the Editorial Boards of the Journal of
Gambling Studies, International Gambling Studies and the electronic
Journal of Gambling Issues. She is a longtime member of the American
Sociological Association and the National Council on Problem Gambling (NCPG).
From 2003 to 2006, Dr. Volberg served as President of this national advocacy
organization. She is a recipient of the NCPG Herman Goldman Foundation Award as
well as the NCPG Distinguished Service Award for Research.
Bob Breen, PhD, is a licensed clinical
psychologist. Breen has been working with compulsive gamblers since 1995 and he
has been on the staff of Rhode Island Hospital's department of psychiatry since
2001. He has published numerous articles on the topic and has presented his
research at national and international meetings. His most well-known work
demonstrated the addictive power of video gambling and had been featured in
national media outlets, including "60 Minutes." He has testified as an expert
witness before numerous states' legislative bodies on the social and psychiatric
consequences of the expansion of gambling opportunities.
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