Lotto Winners -- In Times Survey, Most Of The Lucky Ones Say It's A `Positive Experience' - But There Are Problems, Too

Tired of being treated like a moneybags? Of watching your tax bracket creep skyward? Of wondering where to stash tens of thousands of dollars at a time?

What's that you say? Those aren't exactly your problems?

Then chances are you're not in that select group of 279 folks who over the past seven years have claimed jackpots in Washington state's Lotto game.

In a survey by The Seattle Times, Lotto winners, as one might expect, overwhelmingly called the experience positive. But they report an assortment of challenges, adjustments and dilemmas.

"It's like for a year or so, you're in a fog," said Doris Morgan of Ellensburg, who remembers a vague whirlwind of publicity, attention and appeals for money after she won a $6 million jackpot in 1988.

On the positive side, winners told of financial security, freedom from debt and a cushion for retirement.

On the downside, some mentioned difficulty dealing with expectations of family and friends, assorted requests for money and the simple fact that for some although everyone calls you a millionaire, you're not.

"If you got it all in one lump sum you might be a millionaire, but you don't," said Dennis Waechter, a former Pasco resident. He gets about $49,000 a year for holding one of three winning tickets in a $3.6 million pot in 1985.

"A lot of people don't understand that it's not an endless supply of money," said Waechter, 37, who now lives in New Jersey. "There is a little bit of jealousy and it can be a problem."

In the Times survey, 139 Lotto jackpot winners responded to questionnaires mailed in August and September. Among the findings:

-- Contrary to a popular fantasy, winning Lotto doesn't usually mean telling off the boss and sprinting out the door. Only 27 percent of all survey respondents quit jobs after winning; nearly two-thirds of those who were employed stayed on the job.

-- Solicitors aren't exactly beating down the winner's doors. Although 30 percent were bothered by salespeople, 69 percent said they were not. ("No more than usual," one winner added.)

-- Most, 56 percent, said they're happier now than before winning, but a sizeable group, 42 percent, said they're about as happy now as they were before winning. None reported being less happy now than before winning.

-- Ninety-one percent said that on balance, winning has been a positive experience. Only 4 percent said it was negative while 5 percent called it neutral or had no response.

"There are no negatives about it at all," said Robert Hladek of Seattle, winner of a $1.78 million jackpot in 1985. The jackpot had been billed as $1.7 million, but was driven higher by late ticket sales.

The prize helped Hladek retire early from his job with a bank-security company and allowed him and his wife, Caroline, to take another couple on a cruise through the Panama Canal.

Hladek's sentiment was not uncommon. Asked the worst thing about winning, just over a third of the respondents either had no answer or said there was nothing bad about it.

"It gives you great peace of mind in retirement to know you're not going to be a burden on anyone financially," said Hladek, 65, who gets about $71,000 annually after taxes are withheld from the lottery win.

A feeling of financial security (named by 31 percent) was most often cited as the best part of winning, followed by help with retirement (20 percent.)

For $5 million winner Alta Harless of Spokane, the greatest thing about winning Lotto is simply being alive.

"I'm alive because of the money I can buy prescriptions with and pay for medical care." Harless has a long-term kidney disease. She spent several months in the hospital this year and now undergoes dialysis three times a week.

"Really," she said, "I don't know what would have happened to us by now. We might be out on the street somewhere." Harless' husband, a recreation-vehicle mechanic, had been laid off a week before their 1987 Lotto win.

Now the bills are covered, thanks to the $200,000 lottery checks they'll get every May until 2006.

Fourteen percent of the survey respondents said the fact that people treat them differently now is the worst aspect of winning Lotto.

"You're still the same person you were before you won," said Arlene Knight of Des Moines. "You still get lonely when you're alone. You still wear the same jeans you like."

Knight believes her $1.1 million Lotto win in 1985 contributed to the breakup of a four-year romance.

"He had the feeling he had no control over me," she said. "And that bugged him."

Forty-three percent of the winners were asked for money by strangers, 40 percent by charities and 39 percent by relatives.

"All of a sudden churches you never heard of call you for donations," said Ingrid Unger of Granite Falls, a $2 million winner in 1989. "Salespeople call you from all over the place. I had to change my number several times. Apparently an unlisted number isn't worth the money you pay for it."

More lottery winners, however, said requests for money were not troublesome. "I expected to be bugged by a lot of people and I was not," Knight said. "I was not hassled at all."

Washington state government, pinched by rising expenditures and insufficient tax revenue, started a lottery with instant-winner games in 1982, and added Lotto in 1984 with computerized ticket outlets across the state.

In its present version, in which six numbers are drawn out of 49, the odds of winning Lotto with a $1 ticket are 1 in 7 million.

Lottery spokesman Richard Paulson said 34.5 percent of the winners have picked their own lucky numbers, while the rest have won on computer-generated "quick pick" tickets.

Since Washington's Lotto game began, enough losing tickets have been sold to wrap around the Earth - nearly two times.

But it's not the 959 million losing tickets that fuel daydreams and spark conversations, it's the precious few people who matched all six numbers on ping-pong balls blown from a drum at lottery headquarters in Olympia.

A total of 281 jackpot prizes had been claimed as of last week. That includes two by the game's only repeat winner, William Bopp of Sandpoint, Idaho, who insists the secret behind his 1985 and 1986 jackpots was "just plumb luck."

One $4 million jackpot is being paid, not to an individual, but to a trust fund established after a legal dispute among employees of a Redmond store where the winning ticket was purchased from a small-change supply.

No one in Washington's Lotto has captured a bigger prize than Sandra Vaver of Tacoma, who in June held the only winning ticket for a $13.8 million jackpot. Her annual checks: about $555,000.

"It has calmed down considerably since we first won," Vaver said last week. "It's been a little hectic, but OK. It's exciting."

Vaver and her fiance, Quin Bassi, have had fewer contacts from solicitors since they changed their phone number and, more recently, moved.

"At first I got a bunch of letters," Vaver recalled. "There was one outfit that wanted me to buy a race horse, and another guy wanted $90,000 to get his business out of trouble. Some doctor wanted $9,000 for his clinic. It just goes on."

Vaver and other lottery winners said they were inclined to help churches or causes they were already familiar with, not new ones.

Not everyone's life has improved after winning the Lotto. One winner, Richard D. Smith of South Snohomish County, is to go on trial later this month on charges he robbed an Everett grocery store and bilked customers at his recreational-vehicle business.

At least five winners have died since claiming their Lotto jackpots, partly a reflection of the game's popularity with senior citizens.

In the survey, 12 percent reported some problem dealing with family or friends after the lottery.

One early Lotto winner, who did not want her name published, said she's become estranged from some members of her own family over disagreements about the prize money. "Everyone expects you to pay for everything," she wrote.

"I go out of my way to keep people from knowing I am a lottery winner. I avoid all my old hangouts and for the most part, don't have much to do with old friends."

Although several winners, in follow-up interviews, said they usually avoid mentioning their Lotto win to new acquaintances, the survey indicates severe problems with friends are rare.

Ninety-four percent of the respondents said they generally have the same group of friends as they did before winning, and 80 percent said they see those friends as often or more than they did before.

-- Times news-department research coordinator Tim Rice contributed to this report. -----------------------------

HERE ARE SOME OF THE QUESTIONS WE ASKED.....

-- Did you quit your job after you won the lottery? YES: 27%. NO: 46%. WASN'T EMPLOYED_: 25%. NO ANSWER: 2%.

_Includes retired, homemakers, unemployed

-- Would you say that in general you are happier now than before you won the lotto? YES: 56%. NO: 42%. NOT AS HAPPY AS BEFORE: 0%. NO ANSWER: 2%. ------------------------------

THE BEST AND WORST OF WINNING In the Seattle Times Survey of Lotto winners, questionnaires were mailed in August and early September to all Lotto jackpot winners as of Sept. 1, 1991. Addresses were provided by the Washington State Lottery in response to a public-records request filed by The Seattle Times. Of 275 questionnaires mailed, 139 were completed and returned. Follow-up interviews were conducted with some respondents.

-- Lotto winners were asked to name the best and worst aspects of winning. ------ BEST: ------ Financial Security: 31%. Help with retirement: 20%. Freedom, Independence: 15%. Worry less: 14%. Paid bills, debts: 13%. Can help others: 13%. Can travel, buy things: 12%. Can stay home w/ children: 5%. Other responses: 6%. No answer: 1%.

------- WORST: ------- Being treated differently: 14%. Problems with family, friends: 12%. People think we're rich: 12%. Taxes: 10%. Requests for money: 9%. Investment worries: 6%. Publicity, attention: 5%. Other responses: 6%. "Nothing": 29%. No answer: 6%.

-- Who's happier? Overall, 56 percent of the survey respondents say they're happier now than before winning.

------- WOMEN: ------- Happier than before: 60%. About as happy as before: 40%. Not as happy as before: 0%. No answer: 0%.

------- MEN: ------- Happier than before: 54%. About as happy as before: 43%. Not as happy as before: 0%. No answer: 3%.

-- On balance, would you say that winning the Lotto has been a positive experience?

VERY POSITIVE: 78%. SOMEWHAT POSITIVE: 13%. NEUTRAL: 3%. VERY NEGATIVE: 2%. SOMEWHAT NEGATIVE: 2%. _N/A 2%.

-- Were you asked for money by: RELATIVES: No: 49%. Yes: 39%. _N/A: 12%.

STRANGERS: No: 48%. Yes: 43%. _N/A: 9%.

CHARITIES: No: 50%. Yes: 40%. _N/A: 1%.

Were you bothered sales people? YES: 30%. NO: 69%. _N/A: 1%.

_ no answer -------------------------

MISSING TICKET IS WORTH 1.5 MILLION Maybe you've already won the Lotto and don't realize it. Somewhere out there, in a nightstand, billfold or dresser drawer - or maybe by now in a landfill - is a ticket from May 1, 1991, Lotto drawing bearing the numbers 3-14-24-26-48-49. The Ticket is worth $1.5 million, but only for two more weeks. Lottery spokesman Richard Paulson said if the prize isn't claimed on or before Oct. 28, the May 1 prize will be the fifth Lotto jackpot to expire since the game started in July 1984. Unclaimed jackpots go back into the lottery's prize fund.