Senate Ways and Means Committee
Sonja Caldwell 271-2117
AMENDMENT # 2025-1468s, creating local options for games of chance and relative to charitable gaming licenses to HB 737-LOCAL, creating local options for games of chance.
Hearing Date: April 16, 2025
Members of the Committee Present: Senators Lang, Murphy, Sullivan, Rosenwald and Fenton
Members of the Committee Absent : None
Bill Analysis: This bill gives municipalities a local option to vote to prohibit the operation of games of chance within their boundaries.
Sponsors:
Rep. B. Boyd | Rep. Barton | Rep. D. Paige |
Rep. Schamberg | Rep. Spilsbury | Rep. Stringham |
Rep. Turcotte | Sen. Rochefort |
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Who supports the amendment: Charlotte Lesser, Bonnie Hill, Janet Lucas, Stephanie Osborne, Sheila Donahue, Nancy Donahue, Brodie Deshaies (NH Municipal Assoc.), William Larochelle
Who opposes the amendment: Sarahlynn Williams
Who is neutral on the amendment: no one
Summary of testimony presented:
Senator Lang
- Sen. Lang introduced non-germane amendment #1468.
- He noted that the amendment was being introduced at the request of the Lottery Commission.
- He explained that it is a cleanup measure — in recent years, gaming licenses have been shifting to multi-year terms. This bill removes the annual license requirement and replaces it with a three-year license.
- He clarified that if there is a change in ownership or an arrest, there are still notification requirements to the Lottery within the three-year period. New owners would undergo a new background check process.
Valorie King, NH Lottery Commission
- Ms. King confirmed the amendment was requested by the Lottery Commission.
- She explained that in 2023 the law changed from annual licenses to three-year licenses, removing the annual criminal background check requirement but still requiring annual attestations and payments.
- She reported that this led to confusion, many licensees did not understand they still had to submit annual documentation and payments.
- She stated that this amendment creates a true three-year license, eliminating the annual attestations and fee submissions.
Senator Murphy asked if keno operators are still required to submit annual license applications.
Ms. King clarified that the amendment applies only to games of chance, not keno.
Senator Murphy was concerned about the inconsistency, questioning why keno would require an annual license while games of chance would not.
Ms. King responded that the original three-year license model was not requested by the Lottery Commission, but now they are simply asking for consistency by moving to a true three-year license across the board for games of chance.
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Date Hearing Report completed: April 18, 2025