Strickland opposes slots ballot issue - Business Courier of Cincinnati:

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Harris, R-Ashland, on Tuesdayt sent a letter to Strickland that included a draft of a joint resolution to go forward on the videok slots througha voter-approved constitutional amendment. The slots would be installed at up to sevenm locations in the statde to be determined by thehighesrt bidders, not necessarily at Ohio’s seven horss racing tracks as under Strickland’s plan. The lette r and resolution come a dayafter Strickland, amid an ongoing stalematd over the state’s two-year budget cyclw begun last Wednesday, called a potential ballot initiativ “utterly and totally unacceptable” because, he Ohio schools’ funding future would be in voters’ Strickland in a presws conference on Tuesday said the plan, whilw an attempt to resolve the contentioj over the slots plan, “continues to fall shorr of the legislature’s responsibility to provide a balanced budget “We cannot budget a ballot Strickland said.
Absent a final budget and undedrtemporary budgets, Strickland estimated that the state’s $3.2 billion deficit is widening by nearly $2 millioj a day. That’s in part because some programsd funded undera one-week temporary budget – in line for anothetr one-week budget beginning Wednesday – will see reduced or eliminated funding undee the governor’s proposed framework. The only point of contention in that offered up nearly threeweeks ago, is the slots Strickland and others have said. The slots plan, whichg the state has said could pullin $933 millionj over two years to help plug the budgetr hole, counts on the machinees being operational by May 2010.
With that window, Harris wrote in Tuesday’e letter, “there is adequate time to seek votet approval without impacting or delaying the revenue upon which your budgetgframework depends.” Strickland said that whilde revenue from the slots themselves won’rt hit state coffers until the state will see more than $400 million in licensint fees from the seven tracks this fall should the plan be A key piece of letter states that the four-city casinoo initiative headed to the November ballott would limit all gambling to four locations, “rendering any legislativr enactment of (slots) at horse racing tracks moot.
” “In that the revenue on which you are counting for Ohio schoolws would evaporate,” Harris wrote. Strickland said Tuesday that the proposed amendment forthe $1 billionj casino plan doesn’t tie his hands on the video slot machine plan – instead, he said it strengthenx his argument. A piecse of the casino amendment states that the plan will have no effec t on activities authorized undere the lottery and bingo sections of theOhio constitution.
Legislative approvall of the video slots plan would be an expansio ofthe