Governor Andrew Cuomo wants to move forward with legalized sports betting in New York state.
In Tuesday's State of the State address, Cuomo confirmed that he'll be pushing to get sports betting up and running in the state, a new revenue stream in a state that needs an infusion of cash to cover a $3.1 billion fiscal shortfall before it even gets to desperately needed infrastructure projects downstate.
Cuomo pointed to the fact that investment in upstate casinos saw a nice return on investment. Since those casinos are already in place, Cuomo wants to build on that by legalizing sports betting within those places.
"We invested in upstate casinos. Let’s authorize sports betting in the upstate casinos," he said. "It’s here, it’s a reality, and it will help generate activity in those casinos.”
The move toward legalized sports betting will complete a long-gestating process. New York actually passed a law making it legal to bet on games in 2013. The law ran afoul of a federal ban on state-regulated sports betting, however. That point became moot when the Supreme Court struck down the federal law in question, freeing up New York to allow wagers on games.
Since then, the New York State Gaming Commission has dragged its feet on coming up with guidelines. The state legislature has tried to provide guidelines to no avail. It's thought that Cuomo including revenue from sports betting in his proposed budget for the 2019-2020 fiscal year will light a fire under the people in charge of getting sports betting up and running.
