Sports betting pivoting to regulatory phase for details
Photo | Courtesy of Commonwealth of Massachusetts
Massachusetts State House
The Massachusetts Gaming Commission plans during a meeting Thursday to start discussing the work it will have ahead if or when Gov. Charlie Baker signs the sports betting bill that lawmakers sent to his desk Monday morning.
The bill, which would legalize most sports wagering in Massachusetts, would put the commission in charge of overseeing and writing the rules for the industry. And if the public scrutiny of lawmakers as they tried to reach a deal to make legal betting a reality was any indication, the commission will likely be under plenty of pressure to quickly launch legal betting in the Bay State.
"Over the last several years we have been monitoring legislation that has designated the MGC as regulator of a Massachusetts sports wagering industry, and staff have been doing their due diligence in order to proceed swiftly should a proposal be signed into law," commission spokesman Tom Mills said. He said the agency was reviewing the bill (H 5164) Monday afternoon.
The commission's research arm recently finished an ad hoc report examining the potential impacts of sports wagering in Massachusetts and members of the Gaming Policy Advisory Committee have also begun to consider what they might recommend the commission do as it sets out to write the detailed rules for betting.
"We're going to be in a position of having to deal with drafting regulations pretty quickly to deal with sports betting," Commissioner Eileen O'Brien said in June during a Gaming Policy Advisory subcommittee meeting.
Asked about the proliferation of sports betting advertisements -- something the Gaming Commission has flagged as a serious concern -- and the bill's consumer protections provisions, House Speaker Ronald Mariano said early Monday that the commission will have its work cut out for it as it drafts regulations.
"I think the Gaming Commission has to do their homework and make some determinations about what is appropriate," Mariano said. "It's not an easy call."
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