Residents listen to lottery proposal

By Sara Greene

LITTLE ROCK — Lt. Gov. Bill Halter said higher education has never been more expensive or more necessary.

Speaking at the inaugural First Friday business luncheon hosted by the Morrilton Chamber of Commerce, Halter asked for a show of hands of people who buy lottery tickets when they travel.

Amidst a few embarrassed laughs, a majority of the people in the room raised their hands.

Halter is gathering signatures to put a lottery proposal on the November ballot. If passed by voters, the lottery would generate revenue to supplement higher education funding.

"We need to give our citizens, our voters, the right to decide this issue for themselves. We tried to legislate what people could and could not do once. It was called prohibition, and it didn't work. When we have something like this, we put it to the voters," Halter said.

Walt Rowden of Morrilton asked Halter why he wanted to tax the poorest people.

"It is not a tax. Buying a lottery ticket is a voluntary act. Which tax would you want us to raise to fund higher education instead?" Halter asked

"Any of them. You do anyway," Rowden said.

Last year the state spent about $40 million on scholarships, Halter said. Based on other states, like Georgia, which has a state lottery to support higher education, he said the lottery could generate about $100 million.

He said Arkansas ranks 49thin the number of adults with a college education and 50th in the number of adults with a master's degree. Without an educated work force, Halter said Arkansas has little chance of attracting business and industry.

"It is very difficult to overcome those numbers. If we do incremental steps it will help, but it isn'tgood enough. In the past 10 years Georgia has sent 1 million students to college on Hope Scholarships, which are funded by the statewide lottery," Halter said.

Since 42 states already have lotteries, Halter said an Arkansas lottery would have a good blueprint to follow. There would be a fiveto seven-member lottery commission to provide oversight; annual reports of the receipts, payouts and scholarships would be made public; and administration costs should be between 2 percent and 7 percent of the proceeds.

"All my life Arkansas has been 48th and 49th in per capita income. It's time to take some risks and do something different that's not incremental or nibbling around the edges," Halter said.

Many residents, like Benny Baker of the Ozark Conference Center in Solgohachia, simply haven't made up their minds about the lottery.

"It sounds good on the front end, but you have to look at all the angles," Baker said.

River Valley Ozark, Pages 71 on 02/07/2008