Mississippi Legislature approves bill that may bring mobile sports betting one step closer
In a move that falls short of what many proponents of statewide mobile sports betting had hoped for, the Mississippi Legislature passed a bill Tuesday that would create a Mobile Sports Betting Task Force to study the issue.
The bill now heads to the desk of Gov. Tate Reeves, after the House approved changes made by the Senate earlier in the session.
Currently in order to place sports bets from a mobile phone in Mississippi gamblers must be on casino property. The original version of House Bill 606 would have changed that, expanding that to include the whole state, but that was changed early on in the legislative process. Early last month, the bill's sponsor Rep. Casey Eure, R-Saucier, brought forward an amendment in the House Appropriations Committee that changed the scope of the bill to creating a taskforce, with the hope of passing a statewide implementation bill next session.
Previous coverage:Task force could study mobile sports betting, but it is not likely to be legal this year
"As you know, for the last several years we've been working on a mobile sports betting bill, and at this time we felt it was the proper thing to put this task force together, then hopefully come next year and have a good mobile sports betting bill that this House can pass," Eure said at the time.
The bill went on to pass the House 109-5. An amended version passed the Senate 49-1, and that version was approved unanimously by the House on Tuesday.
After the Senate changes, the taskforce would have 13 members, 11 of which are explicitly listed in the bill. The executive director of the Mississippi Gaming Commission, the commissioner of the Department of Revenue and the chair of the Mississippi Gaming and Hospitality Association could all sit on the committee or appoint members in their places. The chairs of the House and Senate gaming committees would each appoint three members, and each must appoint at least one licensed casino operator. The chairs of the legislative committees would also each appoint a member of their committees to the task force.
If the bill is signed by the governor, the task force would hold its first meeting within 60 days of the bill becoming law on July 1. The Joint Legislative Committee on Performance Evaluation and Expenditure Review, commonly known as the PEER Committee, would have until Dec. 15 to file a public report of the findings of the task force, leaving about two weeks between its release and the start of the 2024 legislative session.
This article originally appeared on Mississippi Clarion Ledger: Bill passes to create Mississippi Mobile Sports Betting Task Force
