August 16 - Late last year, the District of Columbia passed an amendment to
its Fiscal Year 2011 Supplemental Budget Support Act, essentially ruling that
Washington DC is allowed to offer games of skill and chance online to city
residents.
The idea of the amendment was to make Washington DC the first location in
the United States to allow online gambling, putting ahead it of states such as
California, Nevada and New Jersey who are also mulling the idea on introducing
internet gambling.
The city intended teaming with Intralot to launch a series of play-for-fun
games from July this year, and real money games from September.
However, these plans have been pushed ahead after a series of community
outreach meetings set for this month have been postponed to September.
The state lottery company, DC Lottery agreed to the outreach meetings in
order to give residents and interest groups a chance to learn more about the
plans to launch iGamingDC.com.
What is known about these plans is that players will be able to access the
site from their own homes, as well as from a number of commercial sites that
will be set up around the city. There will be strong regulation on the location
of these commercial sites, according to DC Lottery.
Yet, when the meetings were scheduled for July, many residents complained
that they were taking place in the summer months and asked for them to be
postponed.
Meetings to be Rescheduled
Buddy Roogow, speaking for DC Lottery said: "We have heard concerns raised by
some community residents about holding the meetings during the summer months.
Therefore, we intend to reschedule the community meetings. Our goal is to reach
the largest number of District residents possible and to provide a forum to
receive community input concerning the implementation of an iGaming program in
the District of Columbia."
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