Gov. Lingle says she’s not going to reject out of hand new calls to legalize gambling as a way to increase state revenue, according to an AP story yesterday.

I found one short version of the AP story online, but the AP Mobile News application on my iPhone turns up a more complete version by Herbert Sample.

Lingle’s position is a departure from her earlier campaign commitments.

Back in 2002, Lingle said:

I stand FOR Hawaii’s people and AGAINST gambling. Gambling is known to be a get-rich-quick scheme and a mythical economic cure.

Apparently that viewpoint is no longer operative.

Lingle’s statement follows Sen. Donna Kim’s call to again consider the gambling issue.

There’s a similar move in Texas towards legalization, which has been right behind Utah and Hawaii in restricting gambling.

But the need for revenues and the sight of other states raking in huge sums has many Texans asking why not them.

Galveston, the resort island on the Gulf of Mexico, has been decimated by Hurricane Ike, and the location of casinos there would surely aid recovery. Galveston also has a gambling past, and could link the presence of gambling to the town’s historic nature and feel.

Another entrepreneurial group has designs to build twelve or more destination casinos throughout the state, and is lobbying hard for the laws to loosen. Indian tribes await any possible shift in the law, as the federal regulations allow tribes the right to offer any form of gambling available elsewhere in the state.

According to a story in the Houston Chronicle,

The Strand Merchants Association believes gambling would bring in tourists with more money who would patronize the downtown historical area shops, many still struggling to reopen after being inundated with as much as 10 feet of storm water Sept. 13.
The increased tourism could help replace the patrons who won’t be coming back because they were laid off by the University of Texas Medical Branch last month, casino gambling supporters say.
They point to Biloxi, Miss., where casino gambling contributed $22.5 million to city coffers in fiscal year 2008.

In Pennsylvania, legalizing table games like poker and blackjack is being considered, while Ohio is taking another look at casino gambling. New York Governor David Patterson is proposing an expansion of gambling. Maryland has legalized slot machines, and Delaware is looking at sports betting.

The National Conference of State Legislatures compiled this summary of state-level legislative action on gambling during 2008.

I’m sure the lobbyists are already lining up to exploit this new opening for gambling interests, but unfortunately the State Ethics Commission’s web site is not yet reporting lobbyists registering for the new legislative session, so we’ll have to wait a while to see which parts of the gambling industry are going to be putting money into changing Hawaii’s law.

With gambling being reconsidered in so many jurisdictions around the country, that’s going to spread the industry’s resources pretty thin. And the growing competition between states for gambling revenues would appear likely to require reducing revenue projections going forward.

In any case, the gambling issue appears likely to add a bit of spark to the legislative session.

And here’s another history lesson from the pre-politically correct days, when advertising could still promise “brawny men and beautiful girls!”

Just another clipping found among my father’s papers.