(12-01-2023, 05:42 PM)youzigizag Wrote: They have already legalized poker rooms.
The one at Harry Hines and 635 is open 24 hours and business seems very good based on the parking lot and also me personally delivering food inside the place through Uber to poker players.
I assume Dallas was smart...and are easing their way into gambling slowly and measuring crime/homelessness due to the gambling they have allowed on a small scale. Its also an opportunity to measure the local demand for card players. Everyone knows there is going to be slot players.
I dont have data...but I havent heard of crime increase because of these poker houses. But...big money has interest in casinos and can pay local law enforcement and news channels to not report on it if it wasnt too bad. But I assume its going well thus far on a small scale and casinos are in the near future for Dallas. You could go further with this speculation and suggest thats why the Adelson's bought into the Mavs....because the 2 plus years data on poker rooms is going well and Dallas plans to move forward with the casino plans.
There has been a push for legalized gambling in Texas for many years. Yet it's never come close. That's not to say it can't change eventually, but in the past it hasn't been close.
The state of Texas HAS NOT passed a law allowing poker rooms. The existing state law says "A person commits an offense if he knowingly uses or permits another to use as a gambling place any real estate, building, room, tent, vehicle, boat, or other property whatsoever owned by him or under his control, or rents or lets any such property with a view or expectation that it be so used."
The TCH you mention has had a rough go of it, to find a way to operate. They were shut down at one point in 2022. They don't seem to actually be in accord with that state law against gambling, and their workaround under which they eventually were allowed to operate still leaves lots of question marks as to whether they are legal. The way the decision to allow them to reopen came down was incredibly puzzling as to how it was argued and decided - were people paid off? I don't assume they are safe from being shut down in the future, because they still don't align with the law.
And the casino model is exponentially far beyond that, in the scale and type of gambling.
In that context, I'm not as willing to assume that legalized gambling is on the near horizon in Texas. Casinos would require a huge leap in a different direction from how things are.