Despite tough 2020, Lottery Commission agrees to renew licenses for 5 casinos operating in state

CHARLESTON, W.Va. — It’s been a long way back for casinos in West Virginia in the aftermath of the pandemic but new financial numbers from the West Virginia Lottery are suggesting an improvement.

John Myers

The state Lottery Commission learned Wednesday that casinos brought in more gambling money that video lottery parlors during two weeks last month.

“It makes me optimistic,” state Lottery Director John Myers told reporters after Wednesday’s monthly Lottery Commission meeting.

The commission learned details of just how much of a COVID hit the casinos took in 2020 in its relicensing discussion during the meeting. .

Mountaineer Casino in Chester lost $9.2 million in 2020. Mardi Gras Casino and Resort in Nitro reported a loss in revenue of $2.9 million. Casinos in Wheeling in Charles Town reported modest profits. Hollywood Casino at Charles Town had reported a profit of $11.1 million. It was $38 million the year before. Wheeling Island had a $1.5 million profit in 2020. The profit was nearly $7 million in 2019.

Despite the losses, the commission agreed to relicense each casino for another year. Myers said the commission did so on the advice of Charleston-based Brown Edwards Accounting which reviewed all of the financial information.

“They look at them every year and they felt that their parent companies were particularly strong,” Myers said.

The casino at the Greenbrier Resort was given an additional 30 days to submit its annual audit after the person in charge of that work for the casino fell ill.

Myers said he’ll be watching how the casinos perform in the coming months with COVID-19 restrictions removed.

“They were were shutdown (in 2020) three months from the COVID virus and then we’ve had other restrictions on them as we moved past the shutdown,” Myers said. “That meant in some areas they had to reduce the number of (video lottery) machines operating and the number of tables operating,” Myers said.

Overall Lottery Revenues

Conservative revenue estimates, even lower than normal, have helped the Lottery bring in more money than originally estimated this budget year.

The Lottery was $25 million above estimate in May. Revenues are $168 million above estimates 11 months into the fiscal year. The Lottery is outpacing estimates in net revenue by $30 million this fiscal year.

Myers credits some record-breaking performances by Limited Video Lottery locations and the Lottery’s traditional games. He said iGaming and sports wagering increases have also helped.

“We’ve had 20% year-over-year growth in traditional lottery for the last three years at least on the scratch-off side of the business,” Myers said. “We found folks want to see a higher jackpot. So we’ve moved from $1 tickets to $5 tickets”

Myers credits the lottery staff for the changes and the success.

Myers expects overall revenues for this fiscal year, which ended Wednesday. to be around $1.17 billion.

LVL bids

The commission also learned Wednesday the recent 10-year rebidding of the LVL licenses brought in $68 million. The Lottery had expected about $55 million in revenue.





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