Sunday, September 27, 2015
By ROBERT CONNELLY
AUSTINTOWN
As Mahoning Valley residents have flocked to Barry Dyngles pub to buy tickets for their chance at finding the elusive Queen of Hearts and its $1 million-plus jackpot, many have wondered how such a game is legal.
It’s a good question.
Ohio has forms of legal gambling that state agencies oversee: lottery games and the racinos, Ohio Lottery Commission; casinos, Ohio Casino Control Commission; horse wagering, Ohio Racing Commission; and charitable gaming, the office of Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine.
Queen of Hearts does not fall under any of those categories, but into a “gray area,” said Dan Tierney, spokesman for the attorney general.
“We have never gone in and said that the game is legal. That would require someone to go on-site and do a review of the rules ... We can only go in [to do a review] if requested by local authorities,” Tierney said. “There definitely is a gray area.”
“Unless someone in your neighborhood complains, you’re not going to investigate it? It seems to me to be [poor] public policy,” said Neil Clark, long-time lobbyist and president of Grant Street consultants, a Columbus-based lobbying firm. “There seems to be no gray area here – it’s flat-out gaming.”
Clark was active in supporting Internet cafes before the state shut down many of those facilities across the state. He wonders how internet cafes as they were operated could be illegal, yet this game goes unregulated. He argued that the popularity of this game shows what Ohioans want to play.
“This is showing a big demand for low-end progressive games that can make people some money, and they want to engage in it. I don’t think they all want to go to fancy casinos,” Clark said. “I don’t see how you can wrap this cobra in a good-looking paper and not think it’s a cobra.”
People “want to be able to put in a quarter or 50 cents [to bet], they don’t want to kill the bank,” he added.
Tierney rebuffed any comparisons between Internet cafe games and the Queen of Hearts.
“Here the situation is a little different, where most of the establishments that are doing it are a restaurant, and they’re doing it to advertise to bring in business.” It would become a concern if that business is “... no longer running their business – they’re running the game,” Tierney said.
Tierney’s comments are similar to those made by state Sen. Bill Coley of Liberty Township in Butler County, R-4th, chairman of the Joint Committee on Gaming and Wagering. That committee discussed the Queen of Hearts game Sept. 17 and will discuss it further in coming weeks.
“It’s the job of the gaming committee to [make] its finding” and bring it “back to all the [state] reps and senators” to legislate, Coley said.
“The entity must keep very good records of how much money has been collected, how many tickets have been sold, and all the tickets have to match. And they cannot take any penny from the proceeds,” he said.
Ohio Senate Minority Leader Joe Schiavoni of Boardman, D-33rd, has a similar view.
“Bar owners need to be very careful to keep the best records possible to prove that they are not taking a cut,” Schiavoni said. “I haven’t had any questions at all about this game in my office.”
Issues have been raised as the game has gotten more attention while the jackpot has continued to climb to more than $1 million by the drawing at 7:30 p.m. today. As of Saturday night, the jackpot was about $1.2 million and growing.
One of those issues – getting only 50 percent of the jackpot if the winner is not present and the queen of hearts is selected – was solved Thursday night. That occurred during a meeting between township officials and representatives of Barry Dyngles and Nannicola Inc., the Youngstown-based company that sold the game board to the pub.
But other concerns, specifically whether the game defies the definition of a pool game, remain unanswered.
Clark, along with Rob Walgate, vice president of the Ohio Roundtable, a conservative group that challenged Gov. John Kasich’s expansion of the Ohio Lottery to make way for the state’s racinos, cited concerns on the lack of a clear set of rules and the way the pool is operated.
Specifically, Walgate raised concern with patrons having to buy new tickets every week. Previously purchased tickets are taken out of the pool each week that the queen of hearts is not found.
“I think it shows the hypocrisy in the law because there are some other people that we think are acting outside the law of the constitution” and their actions have the “blessing of the governor,” Walgate said, referencing legislation that allowed racinos to operate in Ohio.
“There is no oversight on this game. ... If a game gets to $100,000, how do we know there haven’t been $150,000” worth of tickets sold?
In the case of the Dyngles’ game, no allegations have been made to local law- enforcement or state officials that any proceeds have been removed from the pool.
A similar raffle game, or sweepstakes, is McDonald’s Monopoly, in which patrons of that fast food restaurant collect game pieces during a set time period. If anyone collects every piece of that board – by purchasing food or drink items – they win the grand prize because the same board is used for the duration of the contest.
In the Queen of Hearts game, however, new tickets are needed every week.
Another issue raised by some is that a clear set of rules was not laid out for the Queen of Hearts game. Barry Dyngles was allowed to skip a drawing the week of Labor Day, despite the game being a weekly draw. And last week the rules were changed to allow a winner not to be present. And the date of the drawing was moved from Wednesday to Sunday.
“If you have a clearly set, set of rules, it’s both a protection for the game operator and the players of the game,” Tierney said.
When questions have arisen in recent weeks as the jackpot has grown, many have said local authorities, such as Mahoning County Prosecutor Paul Gains, are responsible to make sure the game is operated legally.
Austintown Township Trustee Jim Davis said at a meeting Friday that Gains and his office “enforce criminal law and as long as there’s no crime, he has no jurisdiction.”
Fellow Trustee Rick Stauffer also said Friday, “We anticipate there may be changes moving forward with the game. ... There haven’t been any rules written” in legislation or by Nannicola.
Messages left at Nannicola last week were not returned.
Doug Duganne, Barry Dyngles’ general manager, acknowledged that there are rules — but he would not be specific. He said the pub is working with suggestions provided by Nannicola for managing the game.
“I cannot believe that somewhere along the line there won’t be some investigation done on what they should or should not do, but because it’s so unique, unless it happens again I’m not sure what they’ll do,” said Ken Carano, Austintown trustee.
Local and state officials have said there haven’t been any complaints about the game. But Sandi Pallo, 69, who lives in the Falcon Crest development on Raccoon Road, says that is not true. She sent an email to Coley’s office last week with concerns about the game.
“If they can change one thing, why can’t they change another thing in the rules?”
She said she walks to the drawing with her husband and the last drawing, on Sept. 16, was crowded and people began leaving after the name was drawn. Raccoon Road was still shut down but “the motorcycles behind us started taking off” and cars were “pulling into the street with a street full of people.”
“It was just a free-for-all, and I’m really afraid someone’s going to get hurt,” she said.