Philadelphia Hosts Major National Gaming Conference On Internet Gambling

Several from Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board participating in presentations

HARRISBURG, PA: Gaming Control Board Chairman William H. Ryan, Jr. along with Executive Director Kevin O’Toole and Bureau of Licensing Director Susan Hensel will participate in the World Regulatory Briefing USA focusing on iGaming on October 22 and 23, 2013 in Philadelphia.

Leaders from the gaming industry along with regulators from state, international and Native American gaming jurisdictions will be presenting at the conference.

The conference will be held at the Sheraton Philadelphia University City and will center on iGaming, a term used to refer to online or Internet gambling. iGaming legislation has already been adopted in some states and is being looked at in others as a way to generate additional revenue. While Pennsylvania has not adopted legislation to permit iGaming nor has the Gaming Control Board taken a stance on the matter, heightened discussions about the adoption of iGaming have led to a need to share ideas and analysis.

Chairman Ryan and Director Hensel, who is the immediate past President of the International Association of Gaming Regulators and chairperson of the conference’s opening day, will provide welcoming remarks on the 22^nd at 9:00 a.m.

Chairman Ryan will then participate in a panel with legislators from Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delaware and Florida along with other state regulators beginning at 10:10 that morning in a panel discussion titled “When and How Can Online Gaming Be a Sustainable Revenue Generator for the State”.

Executive Director O’Toole and Hensel will be on a panel during the second day of the conference beginning at 9:10 a.m. with regulators from California, New Jersey and Iowa. The panel discussion is titled “Exploring Co-Operation Models between Regulators in the United States”.

The conference is being managed by Clarion Events, a firm that produces targeted business-to-business exhibitions, consumer events and conferences serving a diverse range of markets across the globe.

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 30 years, the Gaming Control Board is tasked to oversee all aspects of the state’s casino industry. The 12 casinos in operation all offer both slot machine and table game gambling, employ over 16,000 people, and collectively generate an average of $4 million per day in tax revenue. A portion of that money is used for property tax reduction to all Pennsylvania homeowners; provide funds to the Commonwealth’s horse racing industry, fire companies, a statewide water and sewer project grant program, and the state’s General Fund; and, established a new stream of tax revenue to local governments that host casinos for community projects.

A wealth of information about the Gaming Control Board’s regulatory efforts and Pennsylvania’s gaming industry can be found at www.gamingcontrolboard.pa.gov. At this website, visitors can watch Board meetings live or view videos of past meetings, look up future meeting schedules and past meeting transcripts, obtain information on identifying a gambling problem and gaining assistance, access an interactive map of casino locations, request a speaker for their group, along with much more information. You can also follow the agency on Twitter by choosing @PAGamingControl.

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