The state of New York has inched a little closer to legal and regulated online poker, after S 3898 cleared a Senate committee and has now moved forward to a full Assembly vote. Should the bill pass with a majority vote, it will be left up to Governor Andrew Cuomo to give the final green light.
On May 9th, S 3898 passed the New York State Senate Finance Committee by a 27-9 vote.
It should be remembered that this is not the first time that an online poker bill has reached this stage in New York. Last year, a very similar bill reached the full Assembly, but was virtually ignored and in the end, not voted on at all. Interestingly, it was the bill’s own sponsor, Senator Gary Pretlow who held the bill back at the end, saying that he was concerned that he had not examined the issue of cheating prevention well enough. After the bill died, he visited states such as New Jersey, where he met with the Garden State’s Attorney General to learn more about geo-location technology. Following his visits, Pretlow is now convinced that it is definitely possible to control problems such as cheating and underage gambling using existing technologies, and has said that he will definitely support the new bill when it lands in the Assembly.
“When I do sign off on something,” Pretlow said recently in an interview, “my colleagues feel that it is a good deal and they don’t question why I made a certain decision. They know that if that decision was made, it’s for good reason. So I don’t really see there’s going to be much opposition to moving this along.”
The improved version of S 3898 was introduced this year by Senator John Bonacic, who has fought for legalized online poker in New York for a number of years.
S3898 in a nutshell:
The newly introduced New York online poker will call for up to ten approved operators to pay a $10 million licensing fee. The license will be valid for a decade.
The New York State Gaming Commission and Division of Gaming will regulate the online gambling sites.
A tax rate of 15% on gross gaming revenue will be charged.
The state will approve poker variants such as Texas Hold ’em for play online.
New York will be allowed to enter interstate compacts to increase its player pools.
