By JOAN JACOBSON

The Sun’s editorial of 2/22/09 went a bit overboard, condoning a City Council bill that would raise $5 million in annual revenue from illegal video gambling. It’s bad enough they want revenue from legal gambling with a proposed slots parlor. Here is the letter to the editor I sent them today:

To the Editor:

How naïve of the Sun’s editorial writers (Ka-Ching 2/22/09) to believe that an annual $3,000 fee for each illegal video gambling machine would anger machine owners and even encourage them to go out of business. The fee that City Councilman Robert Curran wants to charge is equal to just three weeks of income for one machine. That’s peanuts to the convicted felons and tax evaders who operate this multi-million dollar business. Your editorial failed to mention that the bill would allow an increase in the number of machines in bars and other businesses. Why the City Council would want to encourage the growth of an illegal enterprise impervious to tax collectors is beyond me. The bill comes, oddly, at a time when the IRS and the Baltimore County vice squad are trying to put some of the millionaires who own these shady outfits out of business. And while an increase in machines might allow the city to collect more fees, it would also increase competition with a legal slots parlor the city is so desperately trying to build downtown.

Joan Jacobson

(I am the author of the 2006 Abell Foundation study that reported the illegal video gambling industry is cheating the government out of millions in taxes each year.)

related Brew post: Councilman wants to charge licensing fee for illegal video gambling machines.