After an extended summer battle, the lottery bill originally proposed by Gov. Robert Bentley has died in the legislature. On Friday afternoon, the Senate voted down the bill previously approved by the House 24-7, ending the possibility of a state-sponsored lottery coming to Alabama in the immediate future.
“The lottery bill for the 2016 special session is dead,” bill sponsor Sen. Jim McClendon said in a press conference . “The people of Alabama have been denied the right to vote on a lottery. The people of Alabama made it clear that’s what they would like the opportunity to do.”
Had it passed, the proposal would have instituted a state-sponsored lottery with the revenue flowing into the General Fund, rather than the Education Budget, to fund Medicaid, prisons and other agencies.
“I wanted to get this lottery issue before the people. I want to do something about the sick kids getting medical care,” McClendon said.
After a debate over the deadline to set up a constitutional amendment, the Alabama House passed the bill on Thursday, surprising members of the opposition. With the ability to make the November ballot a long shot anyway, the bill failed to survive scrutiny over the changes made by the lower chamber.
Bentley, at a press conference following the vote, was irate. “I can’t accept that as a doctor and I can’t accept it as the governor of this state,” he said. “Because one of the things we have to do as a government is this: There are people in this state who cannot take care of themselves. And there are people who depend on government and the government is us.”
Opponents of the lottery argue that the state should be able to make the necessary cuts to funding Medicaid, or adopt a system of “un-earmarking” wherein the restrictions on certain revenue would be removed.
Alabama is one of six states in the country that does not have a lottery for government revenue. In 1999, former Democratic Governor Don Siegelman proposed a lottery that would provide revenue to the Education Trust Fund. Voters did not approve the constitutional amendment, with 54 percent opposed and 46 percent in favor.
