Louisiana Parishes Shut Down Video-Poker Machines

GONZALES, La. - Jerry Henderson breathed a sad sigh of relief as he put his last dollar into a video-poker machine at Cajun Circus Casino, his favorite stop after work.

He was sad because he would miss the game, pressing his luck to try for a royal flush instead of settling for a lesser hand.

But he was relieved that he would no longer spend his nights feeding cash into the machines, risking part of the salary he earns from the machine shop down the road.

"I should be home sleeping," Henderson said after an unsuccessful night of wagering.

Tonight, he will be.

At 12:01 a.m. today, 4,874 of the state's 15,000 video-poker machines were shut down simultaneously in 33 parishes, including the 50 devices at the Cajun Circus truck stop.

One of the largest shutdowns of legalized gambling in the nation came more than two years after voters in the parishes approved a referendum to turn off the machines. Thirty-one parishes voted to keep video poker.

"That's it. That's the end of gaming," said Andrew Flood, director of gaming at Cajun Circus. "I'm feeling a bit sad. There was a lot of work that went into building this place."

Machines in riverboat casinos in and around New Orleans, Shreveport, Baton Rouge and Lake Charles were not affected. Video-poker machines also will stay on in the New Orleans French Quarter and in bars, racetracks and off-track betting parlors throughout the state.

"I don't see how they can just vote my job out," said Kim

Hammell, a cashier at Lucky Chance in Slidell. "It angers me enough to where I ought to go apply for welfare and food stamps. If they don't mind taking my job away, why not let them support me?"

State Police estimate that state and local governments will lose $72 million a year in taxes from the machines.

In Gonzales, taxes from video poker have helped pay for a retirement home, a new town hall and new police cars.

Video-poker operators had worked hard in recent weeks to keep the machines running, filing several lawsuits. But state and federal judges refused to overturn the 1996 vote.

State legislators legalized the machines in 1991, saying video poker would help small businesses. The machines went online in the summer of 1992.

A recent study by a group of economists found that of the $630 million bet in the machines in 1998, only $27.5 million was wagered by out-of-state residents. Critics called video poker the "crack cocaine" of compulsive gambling.

Opponents hailed the shutdown as evidence states can remove entrenched forms of gambling. Yesterday, lawmakers in South Carolina, the state with the most video-gambling machines, approved a bill to let voters decide whether to ban them.