Libraries in Pittsburgh. A lower Bucks County hospital. A new medical school in Scranton. A community college in Erie – if it ever gets built.

Those pet projects and others stand to hit the jackpot if table games are legalized at Pennsylvania casinos.

Each would get a slice of poker, blackjack, and roulette revenue through legislation divvying up what is known as the “local share.”

On close inspection, the 235-page table-games bill doesn’t just add new games to Pennsylvania casinos and new revenue to state coffers. It parcels out the local share in ways that remind critics of an old Harrisburg favorite: walking-around money.

That was the nickname for discretionary grants that legislators steered to projects back home. The long-derided grants were all but banished from the latest recession-ravaged budget. But Eric Epstein sees them coming back with a vengeance in the table-games bill.

Read the full Inquirer article here

Tags: table games

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