Lottery revenues dip

Citing a declining economy and poor brand image for the games, officials said the lottery’s declining performance would reduce contributions to public education by $94 million, about 8 percent less than expected in the fiscal year that ends June 30.

“It makes it more difficult for the lottery to meet the goals in the governor’s scenario,” said Jason Dickerson of the Legislative Analyst’s Office. The revision means lottery sales will slip to levels similar to five years ago, Dickerson said.

Schwarzenegger last week revised his state spending plan with a proposal to borrow against future lottery revenues to generate $15 billion over the next three years. About $5 billion of it would be used to help fill the state’s $15.2 billion deficit in the new fiscal year.

On Monday, the Legislature’s budget analyst called the governor’s sales assumptions overly optimistic. Legislative Analyst Elizabeth Hill questioned whether the state could double lottery sales in 10 years because California has a historically lower-than-average participation rate.

Lottery Director Joan Borucki acknowledged that sales will fluctuate with the economy. However, she said the key to increasing ticket sales is to increase prize payouts. Currently the state constitution caps payouts at 50 percent of revenues but Borucki said other states perform better because they hand out more.

“Even states like Texas and Oregon, they don’t have the same kind of strange or arcane ... restrictions,” Borucki said.

Instead of sales reaching $3.35 billion, the lottery commission on Tuesday approved revised sales estimates of $3.075 billion. Staff said the number of people playing lottery games, such as SuperLotto and Scratchers, is down 10 percentage points from five years ago.

Tags: Stockton

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