The Arkansas lottery’s ticket sales last month slipped by about $700,000 from a year ago, but the lottery raised about $140,000 more for college scholarships than it did in July 2012.
Ticket sales were $33 million last month with $4.89 million raised for college scholarships, the lottery said in its monthly report to the Legislature’s lottery oversight committee.
Scratch-off ticket sales dropped by $2.2 million from a year ago to $26.3 million, while draw-game ticket sales increased last month by $1.5 million over July 2012 to $6.7million, according to the report.
July was the first month of fiscal 2014. Lottery Director Bishop Woosley has projected $459 million in ticket sales and $89.5 million in net proceeds for college scholarships for the forthcoming year.
In fiscal 2013, ticket sales for the lottery dipped by $33 million from the previous year to $440 million. The amount raised for college scholarships slipped by $7.6 million to $89.9 million.
Fiscal 2013 was the first year in which ticket sales and net proceeds for college scholarships dropped since the lottery started selling tickets nearly four years ago. The drop has led state Rep. Mark Perry, D-Jacksonville, to suggest that the lottery commission consider starting socalled “monitor games, ” such as keno, on a trial basis.
The lottery funds the Arkansas Academic Challenge Scholarship program, which has handed out more than 30,000 scholarships during the past three school years. Earlier this year, the Legislature overhauled the program, citing more students than expected getting the scholarship and net proceeds falling short of initial projections.
Woosley said the lottery was helped by “a decent little Powerball run” near the end of last month and by the introduction of the Natural State Jackpot game, which didn’t exist a year ago.
“Given that we have been trying to focus on games which give us a better margin, part of our strategy is working, given that we made a bit less money [in ticket sales], but in the end produced more money for scholarships,” he said Monday.
Woosley said he’s pleased that the lottery raised more than anticipated for college scholarships in July and did not start more than $2 million “behind like we did last year.”
In July 2012, the lottery’s ticket sales dropped by $2.2 million to $33.7 million compared with the same month in 2011, and net proceeds for college scholarships slipped by $2.4 million to $4.75 million. At that time, Woosley said he thought rising gas prices and electric bills could have cut into ticket sales.
Arkansas, Pages 7 on 08/13/2013