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Current permit holders submit bids to keep thousands of video lottery machines

CHARLESTON, W.Va. — A large majority of the 7,800 10-year permits available for video lottery machines in the state Lottery’s Limited Video Lottery program were snatched up in the first round of rebidding that ended Friday, the state Lottery Commission learned Wednesday.

John Myers

State Lottery Director John Myers told the commission bids were received on 7,110 of the permits available totaling $53.8 million. The Lottery also received 382 reserved permits that are awaiting final approval. All of the bids are currently under review for final approval. The results will be posted on the Lottery website.

There’ll be approximately 1,500 permits remaining when the second round of rebidding takes place from March 12-May 20. Myers predicted continued success in the second round.

“We do know that there were a couple of operators who did not bid in the first round and those are expected (in the second round),” Myers told the commission Wednesday. “We expect this will come out very close to the number (of total permits) that we had in 2011.”

Each permit in the first round required a minimum bid of $7,500. The legislature approved a bill last year that allows current LVL permit holders to keep their machines if they match the minimum bid. Minimum bids for the second round are set at $8,500 per permit.

Lottery Revenues

Total revenues for the Lottery in December were $87.5 million. Limited Video Lottery brought in $34.4 million of that total. Sales of instant game tickets for December came in at $14 million, the fifth highest total in the 35-history of the Lottery.

Because of recent record jackpots, sales for Powerball and MegaMillions are expected to show a significant increase when revenue numbers for January are calculated by the Lottery.

Myers reported there was a $1 million Powerball ticket that was sold in Vienna last week and has been claimed anonymously and there was also a $50,000 winner sold at a store in Morgantown.

Halfway through the fiscal year, overall Lottery revenues are $18.5 million above projections.

Deleting language

The Lottery Commission approved a motion Wednesday to remove a previous residential requirement to be an LVL operator retailer. The state has required four years of tax statements to prove residency. The commission recently learned that such a requirement was struck down in a federal court decision.





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