Posted by Hal Dardick at 1:15 p.m.
With hundreds of workers standing behind them in a City Hall corridor, a coalition that would benefit from video gambling today urged the City Council to reverse Chicago’s prohibition on the machines.
Video gambling was approved last year by the state legislature as a way to pay for about 30 percent of a $31 billion state construction program. Without Chicago “opting in” to video gambling, the program would lose about $2 billion in total funding, said Doug Whitley, president of the Illinois Chamber of Commerce.
“Today, business and labor organizations, construction and trade groups, the hospitality industry, neighborhood community groups have come together to demonstrate our support for the state capital plan, creating jobs and support the funding system needed to get our companies and our individuals back to work,” said Jerry Roper, president and chief executive officer of the Chicagoland Chamber of Commerce.
The rally was organized by Back to Work Illinois, a coalition led by Mayor Richard Daley’s onetime campaign chairman, Greg Goldner. In addition to business groups, it includes several unions, the United Neighborhood Organization that has become influential in Daley’s administration and the Illinois Hotel and Lodging Association.
Daley last Friday suggested that the issue go to referendum. "It’s not me, it will be the people who decide this,” Daley said. “If you put it on the ballot, you’ll find out what the people want."
Back to Work has been lobbying aldermen on the issue, but the License Committee led by Ald. Eugene Schulter, 47th, has not scheduled a public hearing on the issue.
Opponents say organized crime has been involved in illegal video gambling and legalizing it could create more gambling addicts. The opponents have convinced a number of cities, villages and counties to ban the machines.
But the numbers of communities joining that bandwagon has slowed in recent months.
Walt Stowe, a former FBI agent who is working as a consultant to Back to Work Illinois, said legalizing video gaming would make it easier for law enforcement to control, because having an unlicensed machine would be a felony.
“Either a machine will be licensed by the Illinois Gaming Board or it will be illegal,” Stowe said. “It’s as simple as that.”