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// Public Gaming International // March/April 2015
Gardner Gurney
Executive Deputy Director of the New York State Gaming Commission
and its Acting Director of the Division of the Lottery
Gardner has over 26 years of experience with the New York Lottery. Gurney’s management experi-
ence is broad and encompasses budget, finance as well as operations and marketing. Gurney also
concentrates on management initiatives in the areas of business strategies, performance management
and multi-jurisdictional lottery games.
Before starting in the Lottery’s Internal Audit Department in 1988, Gurney worked as a manager
in the commercial lending and retail industries. Gurney is a U.S. Air Force veteran and received his
Bachelor’s degree from Husson College in Bangor, Maine.
Carole Hedinger
Executive Director, New Jersey Lottery
Director Hedinger is a Certified Public Accountant with responsibility for day-to-day administration of
New Jersey Lottery, a Division of the Treasury Department, with annual revenues in excess of $3 billion.
Director Hedinger first served at the New Jersey Lottery between 1994 and 2003, first as Deputy Execu-
tive Director/Chief Operating Officer and then as Acting Executive Director overseeing the day-to-day
operations and directing all activities pertaining to the administration and financial management of the
Sales, Marketing, Finance, Security, Information Technology Departments and the 150 employees of the
Lottery. In between her two tenures at the NJ Lottery, Director Hedinger was Chief Clerk at the Ocean
County Surrogate Court from January 2004 to June 2010, responsible for all areas involving the audits of
guardianship and estate accountings—engaged as a forensic accountant to conduct investigations, design
and implement audit procedures, tracking systems, and enforce compliance with the Court’s reporting
requirements of fiduciaries, especially in the area of guardianships. Director Hedinger also served as the
President of the New Jersey Society of Certified Public Accountants from June, 2011 to May, 2012.
Mark Hichar
Partner of the law firm Hinckley Allen and Chair of the firm’s Gaming Law Practice Group.
Mark works out of the firm’s offices in Boston and Providence. Mark’s clients are located within and out-
side of the United States, and include casinos, suppliers of gaming systems and services (for online and
traditional gaming), and investors in and lenders to gaming businesses. He has structured several joint
venture arrangements involving gaming operators and has managed the regulatory approval process with
respect to numerous gaming-related transactions. Mark is a frequent writer and speaker on developments
in Gaming Law and related regulatory actions, and has authored several articles on developments in the
laws relating to online gaming. Mark received his B.A. degree from Yale University, his J.D. from the
University of Chicago Law School, and also studied at the Universität Duisberg-Essen, in Essen, Germany.
Phil Holmes
Vice President, Strategy and Planning, Atlantic Lottery
When Phil started his career in Technology, and it was his desire to integrate the potential of technology
more closely with the mechanics of business. Since then his career has been all about change; not just the
incremental change that comes with the everyday evolution of the job but rather fundamental, far reach-
ing transformation. Over the years he’s consulted in the technology, finance and healthcare sectors all over
the world, specializing in Corporate Strategy, Organizational Performance and Global Change. Before
joining Atlantic Lottery, Phil held roles including; Head of Global Change in a multi-national banking
group, Chief Executive Officer of the UK’s leading personal development company and Vice President
of Business Solutions for an Atlantic Canadian Consulting firm. Phil completed his MBA at Strathclyde
University in Glasgow, Scotland.
