LINCOLN, Neb. (KLKN) – A proposed legislative bill would allow lottery ticket vending machines in the state. Currently, Nebraska is one of three states in the country that does not allow lottery tickets to be sold through a vending machine.

The Nebraska Retail Federation went to Senator Eliot Bostar of Lincoln encouraging him to introduce LB1268 – which would remove the prohibition that a lottery ticket cannot be sold through a vending or dispensing device under the state lottery act.

“It is a staffing concern for us, we’re trying to free up our staff in convenience stores to grocery stores, allowing consumers to purchase lottery tickets in vending machines just so they have the option of skipping the line and getting what they want in a self-checkout fashion,” Rich Otto, the Vice President of Advocacy for the Nebraska Retail Federation said.

The vending machine, which would only be filled with lottery tickets, would require the consumer to enter their driver’s license where it would read the age to make sure minors could not purchase a ticket.

The Nebraska Retail Federation says consumers prefer self-checkout because it’s quick and easy. But for some, quickly does not cut it.

“We’re totally against it because anytime you can make faster gambling, you make faster losers and that’s the problem,” Pat Loontjer, the Executive Director for Gambling With The Good Life, said. “They wanted the machines for the Keno and we fought them for 25 years and now they want to do lottery tickets, I mean how horrible. It’s one thing if a person goes into the grocery store and they go up and they want to buy five bucks worth of lottery tickets and they purchase them. But when you can stand at a machine, and I would imagine they do credit cards or something to that effect, you could stand there and lose your paycheck.”

Loontjer says nothing good will come from this and other forms of expanded gambling.

“Anything that the state – and this is a nationwide statistic –  any dollar that the state gains in gambling revenue, it costs them three dollars in social costs because you’re going to have increased crime, increased addiction, and increased domestic abuse, all of the things that we’re going to have to pay for and it doesn’t show up as related to gambling, but it is,” Loontjer said.

The Nebraska Retail Federation says the Nebraska Lottery has given back millions of dollars. 22-25% of the money earned from the lottery goes back to the state and its beneficiaries like education, help with gambling addiction, and the environmental trust fund.

“And that’s the goal here, we just want to continue selling these tickets, we don’t want it to be a burden to our employees, but freeing up our employees to do other things at the customer service counter and giving the retailer the option of adding the vending machine seems logical on all fronts. We just think it’s a win-win for the retailer, the consumer, and the Nebraska lottery,” Otto said.

The hearing for this bill is set for February 28th at the Capitol.

https://www.klkntv.com/proposed-bill-would-allow-lottery-tickets-to-be-sold-out-of-special-vending-machines/