BILL ANALYSIS �
SB 340
Page 1
Date of Hearing: August 25, 2011
ASSEMBLY COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS
Felipe Fuentes, Chair
SB 340 (Wolk) - As Amended: August 18, 2011
Policy Committee: Governmental
Organization Vote: 16 - 0
Urgency: Yes State Mandated Local Program:
Yes Reimbursable: No
SUMMARY
This bill eliminates the state licensing requirements for
organizations who wish to conduct remote caller bingo games.
Specifically, this bill:
1)Deletes all state Gambling Control Commission (GCC) oversight
and licensure requirements for the conduct of remote caller
bingo, and instead, requires an organization that is eligible
to conduct remote caller bingo games or a management company
contracted by a licensed organization to conduct remote caller
bingo on behalf of a nonprofit organization to register
annually with the Department of Justice (DOJ).
2)Permits a city, county, or city and county to amend an
existing local ordinance that allows bingo games to be
conducted, by resolution, to permit the conduct of remote
caller bingo games pursuant to that ordinance.
3)Shortens from 30 days to 10 days the requirement that an
organization authorized to conduct remote caller bingo games
provide advance written notice of intent to conduct a remote
caller bingo game.
4)Requires DOJ to maintain a registry on its Internet Web site
of all organizations registered to conduct remote caller
bingo.
5)Authorizes DOJ to charge an annual filing fee of $200, to be
deposited into the California Bingo Fund, to cover the actual
costs of the department to administer and enforce these
provisions, and allows DOJ to adopt regulations.
SB 340
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6)Authorizes DOJ to audit the books and records of an
organization or vendor of equipment used in a remote caller
bingo game at any time and to charge a fee for the audit.
7)Allows an organization to conduct one extra remote caller
bingo game per quarter in addition to the current two days per
week authorization.
FISCAL EFFECT
1)The average cost of a DOJ audit is $16,668. If 50
organizations throughout the state use remote caller bingo as
a means of raising funds and DOJ audits each organization
every five years, it would cost approximately $166,680 per
year.
2)This bill authorizes an annual filing fee of $200 for each
organization. That fee would result in $10,000 in revenue to
offset the costs. The remaining $156,000 would likely need to
be covered by the General Fund.
3)One-time costs of $24,000 for DOJ to implement the
registration program and promulgate regulations.
4)Potential costs savings of approximately $100,000 (California
Bingo Fund) for removing the requirement that the Gambling
Control Commission license organizations interested in
conducting remote caller bingo games. Those savings would be
partially offset by a small revenue loss to the California
Bingo Fund due to the elimination of the commissions'
licensing fees.
COMMENTS
1)Purpose . The 2008 remote caller legislation was intended to
allow remote caller bingo events for charitable organizations.
However, the author of this bill contends that the existing
regulatory process is too cumbersome and inefficient for many
charities. According to the author, this bill is designed to
streamline the process and make it easier for the charities to
participate, while still maintaining an oversight process that
ensures legitimacy by bringing in supervision by DOJ and local
law enforcement.
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2)Background . In 2008, the Legislature passed and the governor
signed SB 1369 (Cedillo), Statutes of 2008. The purpose of
that bill was to outlaw electronic bingo machines. As a
compromise in the bill, the Legislature authorized the limited
use of remote caller bingo as a way of helping the non-profit
organizations that had come to rely heavily on electronic
bingo machines for their funding.
3)Remote Caller Bingo . The major differences between remote
caller bingo and traditional bingo are that remote caller
bingo allows for the transmission of an audio and video signal
of a live bingo game from one organization (a YMCA, for
example) located in a local jurisdiction that has adopted a
remote caller bingo ordinance to either an affiliated or
unaffiliated organization (another YMCA or a Boys' and Girls'
Club, for example) located in other jurisdictions across the
state that have also adopted remote caller bingo ordinances.
4)Prior Legislation : SB 1090 (Cedillo), Statutes of 2010,
allowed charitable organizations to conduct remote caller
bingo games up to two days per week, instead of 1 day per
week.
SB 126 (Cedillo), Statutes of 2009, enacted a model local
ordinance for use by local government agencies to sanction
remote caller bingo in the city or county jurisdiction, and
specified that an organization may be authorized to offer
remote caller bingo not more than two times per week.
SB 1369 (Cedillo), Statutes of 2008, banned the use of
electronic bingo machines, but authorized the play of remote
caller bingo up to one time per week in jurisdictions that
have a remote caller bingo ordinance, and created a mitigation
fund to minimize the impacts to the charities that previously
operated electronic bingo machines.
Analysis Prepared by : Julie Salley-Gray / APPR. / (916)
319-2081