ONLINE BETTING: Public officials, experts seek solutions for iGaming's impacts on Pennsylvanians

The road to the Final Four is paved with busted brackets.

Each year, the NCAA Division I Women’s and Men’s Basketball Tournaments captivate sports fans and casual bettors alike during "March Madness."

Approximately $3.3 billion is expected to be legally wagered on the tournaments with U.S. sportsbooks this year, according to an estimate by the American Gaming Association.

It's a time-honored ritual for millions of Americans. It's also a perilous time for people suffering from gambling addiction.

The National Council on Problem Gambling (NCPG), recognizes March as Problem Gambling Awareness Month to increase public discussion of problem gambling and to promote prevention, treatment and recovery services.

Here in Northeast Pennsylvania, Wyoming County is doing the same.

"The weeks-long hype of the 'March Madness' basketball tourney, coupled with the proliferation of easy wagering opportunities, can be a temptation irresistible to those in the throes of a gambling addiction or even individuals teetering on the edge," District Attorney Joe Peters said.

Peters and the Wyoming County DA's Community Action Group are rolling out an education and prevention initiative that will continue after the tournament ends, including programs in the community and schools with a focus on the availability of no-cost treatment and confidential referrals.

"March Madness seemed to be the perfect opportunity to talk about working — particularly with our youth — to try to get ahead of the problem," Peters said last week.

"As the DA, even if there's no criminal implication, there is a moral impact on kids and families and their future," he added. "Shame on me if I don't use the bully pulpit of a public office to create a dialogue."

The DA's Community Action Group previously sought to bring attention to other significant public health concerns, including teen suicide, helping "Grandparents Raising Grandchildren," and focusing on the opioid/fentanyl crisis, such as conducting a county-wide Narcan distribution.

Peters is not alone among Pennsylvania public officials seeking to reduce the harm gambling — especially online gambling — can cause to people of all ages.

'It has evolved into something altogether different'

State Sen. Wayne Fontana first took office in 2005 as Pennsylvania's casino industry was coming into existence.

Act 71 of 2004 paved the way for legalized slot machine gambling at racetracks, standalone casinos and casino-resorts.

The state's first slots parlor, at what was then called Mohegan Sun at Pocono Downs, opened in Luzerne County in November 2006.

"Back then, we didn't even think about iGaming," Fontana, D-Allegheny County, said. "It wasn't even on our radar."

And why would it have been?

The digital landscape looked vastly different then. Facebook, which was created in 2004 for college students, wasn't opened to the general public until 2006. That was the same year Twitter was founded.

Online gambling had existed in various forms since the 1990s, but its legality was in question, and federal lawmakers seemed inclined to curb, rather than expand, it at a national level.

Even now, Pennsylvania remains only one of eight states where iGaming has been legalized, as described in the first part of this series.

Internet gambling's explosion in popularity since legalization in 2017 has Fontana looking at legislative solutions to provide protection to consumers struggling with gambling addiction.

"It has evolved into something altogether different," Fontana said of Pennsylvania's gambling landscape today compared with 20 years ago.

"For my part, I feel compelled to go back and try to tighten things up ... from the original legislation," Fontana said.

His proposed Senate Bill 265 would prohibit the use of credit cards for sports betting and fantasy sports, online casino games and iLottery in Pennsylvania.

A second piece of proposed legislation, Senate Bill 266, would prohibit casinos and the gaming industry from directly marketing and sending promotions to individuals on self-exclusion lists.

Avoiding 'crippling credit card debt'

"Gambling and credit card debt often go hand in hand since this disorder can lead to financial problems that affect one’s ability to pay off debt," Fontana's sponsorship memo for SB265 states.

"With the average Pennsylvanian having a credit card balance that exceeds $5,640, online gaming should not be another scenario to accumulate more debt," Fontana's memo adds.

James Robinson

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Pennsylvania Senate Democratic Caucus

He is not alone in this concern.

Earlier this year in Maine, state Rep. Marc Malon proposed a bill that would prohibit the use of credit cards in online sports betting there.

Similar legislation has been proposed in Illinois, where that state's Gaming Board was already moving toward regulations banning the practice.

Seven states already have such bans, industry trade publication SBC Americas reports, and others are considering similar legislation.

Some of the industry's biggest names are also moving in that direction.

FanDuel Sportsbook announced last month that it would no longer accept deposits by credit cards beginning March 2, the Associated Press reported, while DraftKings Sportsbook took that step last August.

Fontana applauded the move, but said legislative action is still necessary.

"While FanDuel joins DraftKings in no longer accepting credit cards, these are not the only sportsbooks operating in Pennsylvania and company policies can be reversed," he said. "That is why the commonwealth must act to protect consumers by banning credit cards for online gambling."

Will the legislature act?

Fontana acknowledged that the bills, first introduced in 2024 and currently awaiting committee consideration in the Republican-controlled Senate, may not advance this session.

"If nothing happens this year with this, I'll reintroduce it, but you can bet I'll be sending more information out, trying to have more hearings," the senator said.

"It's about educating people and my colleagues about the ramifications to their constituents — not just mine, obviously — and hopefully gain some support moving forward," Fontana added.

They're chasing that win, and the money runs out'

WVIA

In Wyoming County, Peters hopes to remind people of all ages that problem gaming can have far-reaching consequences that touch communities at large.

"The addictive nature of the algorithms causes people to get in deeper and deeper, so they're chasing that win, and the money runs out," he said.

Whether online, in a casino or on platforms, "the belief that the next big win will rescue the bettor from growing debt and borrowing gambling money are a recipe for personal disaster," Peters said.

"So you end up stealing or taking from family, and that's why you see the proliferation of, you know, so many otherwise good people who are now stealing from the Little League account because they're the treasurer, or taking people's money instead of booking their travel, stealing from your grandmother and then hiding it," he said.

"It just continues endlessly until there's a complete crash."

'Your bank account looks like it's been hacked'

Evidence of problematic gambling takes many forms, but financial damage is typically at the top of the list.

"A lot of people who have been through a kind of gambling addiction will tell you that the first visible, outward symptom of gambling addiction is your bank account looks like it's been hacked," Almond Digital Health CEO Kevin Winters said.

Winters is a longtime healthcare industry executive who cofounded the company that provides a mobile app tailored for those worried about excessive gambling and their loved ones. It is no-cost for users and is funded by government and industry partners, he said.

Winters has worked with clients in Pennsylvania, which he said is one of only five states that have all types of gambling products — iGaming, sports betting, land-based casinos, horse racing, bingo and lottery.

Among Almond's clients in the state is a financial institution that revealed the top five vendors its customers spend money with: Amazon was 1, Walmart was 5, and the three in the middle were all online gambling companies, Winters said.

Gamblers Anonymous, a national organization with local chapter meetings around the country, offers a widely-used list of 20 questions to help people assess whether they are problem gamblers.

Of those 20 questions, seven deal with gambling and money:

• Did you ever gamble to get money with which to pay debts or otherwise solve financial difficulties?
  
• After losing, did you feel you must return as soon as possible and win back your losses?
  
• Did you often gamble until all your money was gone?
  
• Did you ever borrow to finance your gambling?
  
• Have you ever sold anything to finance gambling?
  
• Were you reluctant to use "gambling money" for normal expenditures?
  
• Have you ever committed, or considered committing, an illegal act to finance gambling?

Kyle Popish, a Lackawanna County-based counselor, spoke about the nexus between money and problem gambling in the first part of this series. It's an issue he discussed at length in a recent interview.

He also stressed that a healthy relationship with money is essential to recovery.

"It's really about working with financial literacy, making sure people understand how budgets work. You know what money is, where it has to go," said Popish, owner of Whole Path Wellness.

Popish recalls a phrase he learned during a conference from GamFin, a national nonprofit that provides financial counseling for individuals and families with gambling-related financial problems.

"The gentleman that represented GamFin, when he spoke, he said, 'every dollar in your bank account should have a job.' And I love that one. So when you look at your bank account, every dollar that's in there should have its designated role," Popish said. "So really, learning how to manage your finances is very important."

'A lot of people looking to get help voluntarily'

For those in the treatment world, educating people about responsible gambling is a shared goal.

"They say 98% of us gamble and it's not necessarily a problem," said Jason Harlen, CEO for Wyoming Valley Alcohol and Drug Services, a private nonprofit group that provides counseling for a range of issues.

"We are not against gambling. We're just here to help people who have a problem with it," he added.

Spending too much money on gambling is a key factor, he said, but "problem gambling is a very broad definition" with other warning signs.

"Are they missing work? Are there marital or relationship issues because of the gambling? Is there a disconnection when they can't gamble? Are they preoccupied? There's so many things that define problem gambling," Harlen said.

Like others interviewed for this series, Harlen said his organization has seen the number of people seeking problem gambling treatment spike as online betting becomes more popular.

"That accessibility has really caused a lot of problems. I mean, you know, you can literally wake up in the morning, sign on to your phone or your iPad and gamble your life away. So it's very scary," Harlen said.

If there's an upside, it's that people are seeking treatment, he said.

"There's a lot of people looking to get help voluntarily, so that's a good thing," Harlen said.

"It's very embarrassing sometimes for people to get help," he said. "We are seeing a lot more people trying to defeat that stigma."

Council on Compulsive Gambling of Pennsylvania (CCGP) Executive Director Josh Ercole said his agency is seeing a shift not just in the number of requests for help through the agency's 1-800-GAMBLER helpline, but in where they're coming from.

"Traditionally, what we saw would be the highest rates by far were in the most populated areas where there were the highest concentration of casinos," Ercole said.

"I wouldn't say we've seen this dramatic shift where, now, you know, we get the same number of calls from Elk County that we do from from Philadelphia County, but we're seeing more," he said.

"Where we used to maybe get zero calls a month, or one call a month, maybe now we're getting like three or four or five, right? And there's those counties out there where that increased access is typically related to a newer form of gambling," Ercole said.

And as Harlen noted, Ercole stressed that overcoming stigma is vital.

"Folks understand that a substance creates a physical [reaction] and that's where the addiction is, but in most cases, that's only a piece of it. A lot of times it's related to the brain and the relationship to that activity," Ercole said.

"The same thing happens with gambling, but it's very difficult for folks to wrap their head around the fact that someone can become addicted to a game. And a lot of times, there is a lot of judgment that goes along with that," he said. "And there's a lot of feelings that the folks who are struggling really try to keep inside because they don't want to be judged."

The state requires that the 1-800-GAMBLER helpline appear on all casino and sports betting ads, and Ercole said people don't always realize that the service is entirely separate from the casinos.

"It's free, it's confidential, and it's not just for the most extreme problems," he said.

"And that's one of the really most important pieces, because there's a lot of folks out there that don't recognize that what they're doing is potentially problematic," Ercole said.