An emergency meeting called Friday still wasn’t enough for Gaming Commission members to agree on actual dates for the potential launch of sports betting here, but they were at least able to agree on broad timeframes for in-person gaming to begin. and mobile betting next year.
Commissioners agreed to set “late January” as the launch date for Category 1 sports betting operators, meaning the state’s two casinos and one slot machine parlor, and to set “early March” as the launch date for Category 3, or mobile operators. The process for Category 2, which includes the state’s two simulcasting centers, is on hold as the commission awaits more information from those facilities, officials said.
If the target dates are met, Massachusetts bettors will be able to bet on the Super Bowl at Plainridge Park Casino in Plainville, MGM Springfield or Encore Boston Harbor in Everett, and then bet on the March Madness college basketball tournament via mobile. . This type of tournament is the only situation in Massachusetts where bets can be placed on events involving a Massachusetts college or university.
But the Commission raised a number of objections to its vote on Friday, making clear it may have to reconsider the “late January” start of retail betting if staff working behind the scenes to launch betting encounter “extraordinary circumstances” or if there are significant problems appear in public comments. And the start of digital betting “in early March” could be delayed if the commission receives a large number of applications for the seven mobile licenses it can issue.
“Okay, let’s go, everybody. Make it fun,” said Chairwoman Cathy Judd-Stein after the commission’s 4-0-1 vote. Commissioner Nakisha Skinner, who has made it clear she is uncomfortable with the idea of setting the commission’s timeline based on the sports calendar, held back.
What the commission finally agreed to around 3:30 p.m. Friday reflected the updated recommendation that CEO Karen Wells made at the start of the 12 p.m. meeting.
The debate that filled the hours in between boiled down largely to the risks the commission was willing to accept in trade-off for speed. For example, the timeline Wells presented Friday assumes the commission will support an abbreviated approach to reviewing third-party vendors. But when that discussion came later Friday, it led to a significant debate among commissioners.
Skinnner said she was not comfortable with the Gaming Commission using a less detailed process for the world of sports betting than for the casino gambling sector. Commissioner Eileen O’Brien said she has many of the same concerns.
“The risk is the same and therefore, in my view, we should apply the same rules to all sides of sports betting that we have for gaming vendors,” Skinner said. “If we’re going to require them to be licensed at all, I see no difference. I see no reason to have a different set of rules.”
O’Brien offered a compromise that was eventually accepted by the other commissioners: to use an abbreviated process to begin with, but to insert a limitation clause that would revert to the more usual and detailed process of the Outside Vendor Review Commission on Sept. 1. , 2023. This allowed the commission to refocus its attention on its potential timeline.
At one point during Friday’s meeting, Wells and the commissioners delved into a discussion about the actual launch dates for in-person betting. Wells first proposed a Jan. 26 start date, but commissioner Brad Hill said he would prefer Jan. 18, and O’Brien thought the group had largely settled on two weeks outside of the Super Bowl, which would have been Jan. 29.
That date, Sunday, Jan. 29, had been discussed for some time and seemed reasonable to commission staff because it would not overlap with a busy Friday or Saturday night at the casinos. But then Wells received a text message from an unknown number that raised even more concerns: Sunday, January 29 is the date of the AFC and NFC championship games, the contests that decide which teams go to the Super Bowl and betting magnets themselves per se. .
“If you were to make it effective at 12 a.m. on the 29th, it would actually be extremely volatile,” said Sterl Carpenter, commissioner of the Regulatory Compliance Commission, referring to the massive rush of bettors that would be expected.
