Alabama lottery bill advances to full House for vote

The secretary of state’s office had named Wednesday as the last day to get a constitutional amendment approved and add it to the November election. Sen.

Several failed bills and cloture votes later, while some progress has been made in the Statehouse effort to stitch together Alabama’s fraying fiscal fabric, it’s mostly been just that: an iron-on patchwork political solution, addressing half an issue here, a bit of an issue there, but never directly and seriously addressing the underlying problems burdening state finances.

The bill, which was proposed by Governor Robert Bentley, aims to regulate the state lottery.

A proposed state lottery will not go before voters in November. The lottery is eyed as a way to get money to Medicaid long term. Ballots are set to be printed Monday.

“They are afraid to let the people vote”, Ford said. “I want my colleagues to put themselves in our shoes and think what would they want if this happened in their area”.

At first, the bill was designed in such a way as to have all the lottery revenue go towards the general fund.

Marsh pointed out that Mobile and Baldwin Counties have thousands of people on Medicaid who are in need of funding.

“I’ve been poor all my life and the lottery had nothing to do with me being poor”, he said. That bill moves forward for debate in the House of Representatives this week.

Rep. A.J. McCampbell, a Democrat from Greensboro, said he opposed the bill, saying he feared it would give the Poarch Band of Creek Indian a monopoly on electronic bingo machines in the state. The House-passed version would steer 90 percent of the money to the general fund and 10 percent to education.

There was confusion Wednesday about whether the bill could still appear on the general election ballot.

When the BP Settlement bill was brought up in the state senate on Wednesday, one senator compared the debate to the Civil War.

Secretary of State John Merrill is planning a 3 p.m. press conference to discuss the situation. Prior to being passed by the Senate with a rather thin margin of 21-12, the bill had undergone some significant amendments to make it acceptable for the majority. Lindsey said those department had suffered from budget cuts for several years.

Senators could split on whether to increase the debt payment – and free more money to Medicaid – or send $191 million to Mobile and Baldwin counties, hit hardest by the oil spill, for road projects.

“It was not my decision to wait until the middle of August to call this special session”.

Paying debts early would free up $70 million in state funds that could help avoid Medicaid cuts in the fiscal year that begins October 1.