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Lotteries
mean big
money
NORFOLK — When Pennsylvania sold its first 50-cent ticket 15 years ago, the lottery was envisioned as a modest, $30 million-ayear fund-raising device to help the state’s elderly.
It became a billion-dollar-a-year behemoth, an embarrassment of riches that for years nagged state legislators with more money than they were ready to spend.
In the 1970s, the state used lottery profits to help retirees pay property taxes and rent. As the surplus mounted, the General Assembly added home-delivered meals, visiting nurses, free bus rides and grants to offset inflation.
By 1980 there was more than $200 million in unspent lottery proceeds in the state treasury — an awkward situation in an election year. The General Assembly needed a way to get rid of some of it as fast as possible.
So in the weeks before Christmas, 420,000 elderly residents received $100 checks in the mail, along With a note telling them of their benefactor: the Pennsylvania lottery. •'
Fiscal Santa Claus stories like Pennsylvania’s are as common in the lottery business as losing tickets. And they most likely will form .the bulwark of a pro-lottery campaign this fall when Virginia’s General Assembly sends the issue to the voters in a Nov. 3 referendum.
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