Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board's New Meeting Space In Harrisburg Will Better Serve the Public

Facility Will Also Be Permanent Home to PGCB's Office of Hearings and Appeals

HARRISBURG, PA: The Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board, the agency that regulates casino gaming in the Commonwealth, has established a permanent location for its meetings in the Strawberry Square Complex in downtown Harrisburg.

Located on the second floor of Strawberry Square at 303 Walnut Street in Harrisburg, the Board will hold its final public meeting of 2011 in the new space on Tuesday, December 20th beginning at 10:00 am. Subsequent meetings of the Board will also be held in this location unless otherwise advertised.

The new location, according to Gaming Control Board Chairman William H. Ryan, Jr., is designed to better assist the public by providing both a more easily accessible location to view its Board meetings in person while also providing modern capabilities that will permit remote viewing of meetings via the Internet.

“The new offices not only provide this agency, for the first time, with a permanent and easy-to-locate home for all of its Harrisburg board meetings, but is also equipped with new technology to assist those who are unable to attend a public meeting in person to watch meetings live via the PGCB’s web site,” Chairman Ryan says. “These benefits further the agency’s efforts to make its business as visible and accessible to the public as possible.”

Ryan says the Board plans to begin streaming meetings live on its website in January. Full video recordings of meetings and public hearings are already available on the web site, and will continue to be offered in addition to the live broadcasts.

The Office of Hearings and Appeals functions as an independent arm of the PGCB with the authority to conduct hearings and issue reports and recommendations for the Board’s consideration. OHA’s Hearing Officers routinely conduct hearings involving the following:

Denial of licenses, gaming permits and registrations;
Enforcement Actions filed by the Board’s Office of Enforcement Counsel;
Petitions filed by licensed entities and others;
Other matters that come before the Board that may require an evidentiary hearing.

According to Director of the Office of Hearings and Appeals Linda Lloyd, the move to the Strawberry Square Complex provides easier location and access for those individuals who have business with her office.

“Hearings on licensing matters, whether involving the license of an individual or a company, frequently involve persons unfamiliar with Harrisburg,” says Lloyd, “and this location will help those from out-of-town who have business with us.”

The complete 2012 Board meeting schedule is available on the Gaming Control board’s web site, www.gamingcontrolboard.pa.gov, under the Board Meetings tab. In addition, a link for Hearings and Appeals under the Gaming tab provides the public with both an archived and ongoing schedule of hearings before that bureau.

About the Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board:
The Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board was established in 2004 with the passage of Act 71, also known as the Race Horse Development and Gaming Act. Pennsylvania’s first new state agency in nearly 40 years, the Gaming Control Board is tasked to oversee all aspects of the state’s casino industry. Currently, the ten casinos in operation in the Commonwealth employ almost 15,000 people and legalized slot machine and table gaming has generated $5.5 billion in tax and license fee revenue since the first casino opened in November 2006. A portion of that money is enabling property tax reduction for all Pennsylvania homeowners, providing needed funding to the Commonwealth’s horse racing industry, funding grants for fire companies and water/sewer projects, and establishing a new stream of tax revenue to local governments for community projects. A wealth of information about the Gaming Control Board and Pennsylvania’s gaming industry can be found at www.gamingcontrolboard.pa.gov. At this web site, visitors can view videos of Board meetings and on the operation of the PGCB, obtain information on identifying a gambling problem and gaining assistance, look up future meeting schedules and past meeting transcripts, access an interactive map of casino locations, request a speaker for their group, along with much more information.

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