Illinois lawmakers are giving serious thought to ensuring any skeeball betting stays nice and friendly, not part of someone’s business plan.
The gaming committee of the Illinois House of Representatives met Thursday and advanced legislation that will prohibit establishments like Dave & Buster's from "facilitating wagering" on their games at their place of business.
The legislation would also ban a "family amusement establishment" from promoting gambling on its games, namely those that require inserting a coin or token to activate.
While the sponsor of the bill tried to refrain from mentioning Dave & Buster’s, his comments suggested it was the company’s recently revealed plan to launch a betting feature on its app that was the inspiration for the measure.
“The catalyst of this legislation was a recent announcement by a prominent family arcade establishment that they intended to begin allowing real money wagering on the games in their facilities across the country,” Democratic Rep. Daniel Didech told committee members.
losing the house, the car, and the kids at Dave & Buster's, a fine gambling establishment pic.twitter.com/4eeAVhXQ99
— eric rivera (@ericriveracooks) May 2, 2024
News broke late last month that Dave & Buster’s Entertainment Inc. planned to add a wagering element to the company’s app. The feature would allow loyalty members to compete and wager real money against each other on skeeball and other games while earning rewards.
There was a fair amount of joking on social media about the announcement, but there was also some genuine pushback and scrutiny from state gaming regulators, such as the Ohio Casino Control Commission.
In Illinois, however, there are potential legislative consequences for Dave & Buster’s, which owns and operates more than 200 entertainment and dining establishments across North America — including a handful in the Land of Lincoln. Didech had this to say.
My view, and I believe that this view is shared broadly, is that the proposed gambling activity at these arcades is for several reasons out of alignment with how responsible gambling operations should be conducted in the state of Illinois.
The raising of questions
Among other things, Didech said the proposed wagering feature would be open to anyone aged 18 and older, despite the legal age for gambling in Illinois being 21. The Democratic lawmakers told the committee he downloaded the app of the gamification company Dave & Buster’s intended to work with on the feature, Lucra, and was asked to confirm he was over 18 but not required to submit any identification to verify that claim.
While Didech said the Dave & Buster's announcement was framed as making friendly wagers of $5 or so on who would win at Pop-A-Shot or another game, the Lucra app first invited him to wager on whether NBA players would outscore each other.
“Which I think raises some very serious questions about how this is going to be applied in a local arcade environment,” he said.
Some lawmakers likened the move to trying to do an end-run around the current licensing requirements in the state, such as those for legal sports betting and video gaming terminals.
“And just like anyone else who wants to seek licensure in those areas, they have the right to do that,” Didech said.
The lawmaker also charged there would be a lack of problem gambling resources, that it could have negative consequences for licensed gambling operations, and that there would be no oversight to ensure the integrity of games.
“I think this is an appropriate approach to what was a surprising and somewhat alarming announcement that family arcade gambling is on the verge of being offered in several Illinois communities,” Didech said of his legislation.
The Golden rule
Didech claimed he had yet to hear any opposition to his legislation, which he suggested will still be tweaked before it goes for a full vote in the House. He mentioned Golden Tee and pool tournaments at bars as examples of what he does not want to see banned.
“We're not trying to ban those sorts of contests,” Didech said. “And we are going to refine the language to make sure we're not accidentally prohibiting those types of contests.”
The gaming committee voted unanimously to adopt an amendment to House Bill 394 by a 15-0 margin. It was then reported to the House floor for further action.
H.B. 394 was previously a piece of legislation sponsored by another lawmaker that made a minor change to the Illinois Horse Racing Act.
Didech filed a separate bill aimed at stopping the facilitation of gambling at arcades. However, the lawmaker has now essentially commandeered and amended H.B. 394, which was further along in the legislative process, to make it the host for his "Family Amusement Wagering Prohibition Act."
“I think we want to write this broad enough that we're not inviting people looking for loopholes,” Didech said. “How they could welcome this sort of activity on their premises without being technically in violation of the law. So I think we are writing the definitions and the prohibitions with that in mind.”
