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Md. public support for slots increases
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| Contributor | U Ole Polecat |
| Last Edited | U Ole Polecat Jan 10, 2005 08:53am |
| Category | News |
| News Date | Jan 10, 2005 12:00am |
| Description | from the article:
"The people who drive through Baltimore and see all those slots billboards from Delaware and West Virginia, I can't understand why they're not incensed," said Senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller, the most powerful slots advocate in the legislature. "Each one says to the driver, 'You're building schools in Delaware and West Virginia and now Pennsylvania,' and yet the kids in Maryland have to go to school in trailers."
The 56 percent approval rating is the highest level slot machines have achieved in the annual Sun Poll, up from 52 percent at this time last year. The number of people who oppose slot machines dropped 2 points, to 37 percent.
The margin of error for the poll, a survey of 800 likely voters conducted Tuesday and Wednesday last week by Potomac Inc. of Bethesda, is 3.5 percentage points.
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"I know there are people out there who have gambling problems, just like there are people who are alcoholics," said Laurie Mathison, a poll respondent from Cockeysville. "For the most part, when you're an adult, you're supposed to be responsible for your own weaknesses. To be objective about it, it's added revenue to the government, and I think we should go for it."
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Although the Baltimore region supports slots by a 2-to-1 margin, poll respondents in Maryland's Washington suburbs were evenly split on the issue, with 47 percent opposed and 46 percent in favor of them. Montgomery County was the only jurisdiction where the poll found a majority opposed to slots.
Jeffrey Laizure of Gaithersburg said he sees slots as "a poor excuse for proper tax policy." Maryland should decide what programs it needs to fund and find the fairest way to raise taxes to pay for them, he said.
"Doing pie in the sky with slot machines is not the right way to go," Laizure said. "It is taking from potentially the poorest and giving it to the state to use to satisfy its needs. I see that as regressive taxation." |
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