More delays for Washington DC online casino

The 13-member city council for the District Of Columbia passed an amendment to its Fiscal Year 2011 Supplemental Budget Support Act in December of last year to allow DC Lottery to offer games of skill and chance including poker over the Internet to residents.

This move was intended to steal a march on other jurisdictions including New Jersey, California and Nevada that were mulling over moves to legalise online gambling and the operator had planned to team up with Greek supplier Intralot to launch play-for-fun games from July followed by real-money games in early-September at iGamingDC.com.

However, DC Lottery subsequently agreed to hold a city-wide consultation following protests in order to give residents, community associations and the 37 Advisory Neighborhood Commissions a chance to weigh in on the proposals. These community outreach meetings were scheduled to begin this month but have now been delayed until mid-September and will not conclude until sometime in October.

“We have heard concerns raised by some community residents about holding the meetings during the summer months,” said Buddy Roogow from DC Lottery. “Therefore, we intend to reschedule the community meetings. Our goal is to reach the largest number of District residents possible and to provide a forum to receive community input concerning the implementation of an iGaming programme in the District Of Columbia.”

The proposed new online casino at iGamingDC.com would be made available to players in their own homes as well as via a few commercial sites dotted throughout the nation’s seventh largest city. The proposition would also see all public locations where officials are set to allow access to the gambling site posted 60 days before any final decision is made.