Senate passes gambling bill that includes internet poker study

Publication Date: 2011-04-21

• Author:Kay Henderson
• Publication:Radio Iowa

Senator Randy Feenstra, a Republican from Hull, tried to get the senate to vote to forbid smoking on the casino gaming floors --a loophole granted to casinos when the legislature passed the statewide smoking ban in 2008. "It was a truly a bad day for government because why would you ban it everywhere else but your own casinos, and I know that answer it's probably because of the revenue the state gets, but that's truly an embarrassment," Feenstra said.

Senate President Jack Kibbie ruled a proposal to ban smoking at the casinos was outside the boundaries of the bill, so debate on that proposal was forbidden. The bill originally would have allowed the state's casinos to set up an online poker network in Iowa, but that was stripped from the bill in favor of a study.