Wednesday, April 04, 2007

It's an open secret that fraternal organizations and veterans groups finance
many of their activities, including works of charity, through small-time
gambling. Punchboards and pool sheets have long been passed along the bar,
with at least the tacit approval of law enforcement. These devices now are
legal as long as the clubs buy a license for small games of chance, but in
recent years some places have installed poker machines. The attitude has
been that as long as such gambling does considerable good and little harm,
it could be left alone. Still, the Associated Press reports that in the
Lehigh Valley of Eastern Pennsylvania, somewhere around 40 private clubs
were cited for illegal gambling during 2006. Although officials deny it,
club leaders fear that the state is stepping up enforcement to wipe out
competition for the licensed slot machine operations. At this point, there
is little hard evidence of that. There is a slots casino planned for
Bethlehem, but it isn't scheduled to open until July 2008. Meanwhile, we
have seen no such crackdown here, even though The Meadows slots parlor will
open next month. We also doubt that club gambling will keep many people away
from the slots parlors. Unlike bingo games, which really may suffer from the
new operations, nobody goes to the clubs just to gamble - it's just part of
the general atmosphere of drinking and socializing, which are the main
draws. It's not inconceivable that someone would hit on targeting club
gambling for fear it will take revenue away from the state. We just hope,
though, that such temptation will be resisted.