Taken to the limits

Jason Unrau
Northern News Services

Inuvik (Mar 12/04) - The town's Lottery Committee met last week to discuss limiting bingo at Christmas time and during National Addictions Awareness Week.

While many are in favour of the idea, there are those -- particularly the service clubs -- who feel they are already being gouged by the town's bingo licensing practices.

For organizations wanting to book bingos more than three months in advance (the Legion falls into this category with its regular Wednesday night games), there is a 50 per cent surcharge added to the cost of securing the bingo license. The standard surcharge is 30 per cent.

These clubs, as well as other organizations which hold bingos, depend on the revenues to support various non-profit endeavours they engage in or support each year.

What sparked this debate was a letter to the Town of Inuvik from Barry Greenland, president of the Ingamo Hall Society.

"The Ingamo Hall Friendship Centre would like the Town Council to consider revising its bylaws to defer the issuance of lottery licenses from Dec. 15 to Jan. 15 the following year," he wrote.

Under the town's current bylaw, a bingo blackout is in place for the last two weeks of December.

In his letter, Greenland also cites gambling as the number one addiction that continually interferes with "any community sponsored event."

This was echoed by Ingamo Hall's executive director Grace Allen.

"As a friendship centre, we hold a variety of Christmas events and found that we had no participation," she said. "And we found that bingo was interfering."

Though Ingamo Hall's own bingo profits -- garnered from its regular Tuesday night games -- are down, Allen estimates the centre will earn between $40,000 and $50,000 this year from bingo.

At the Lottery Committee meeting there was talk of reducing the number of bingos each week from six to three and pushing the game's starting time back from 7 p.m. to 8 p.m.

However, committee chair Marja van Nieuwenhuyzen says only the recommendations on extending the Christmas bingo blackout and halting bingo during NAAW in November will be presented to council.

Gambling top addiction

Hardly consoling news to Royal Canadian Legion Ladies Auxiliary President Eileen White. Not only is her organization fearful that limiting future bingos will hurt its revenue -- thus hurting its ability to support youth and elder activities -- but it will push gambling underground.

"When we hold our bingos, the funds we raise are going back into the community," she wrote in a letter to the Lottery Committee and town council. "Like it or not, people in this community like to gamble and if they can't play while sitting at home in front of the TV, they will take part in illegal gambling."

On top of the cost of a bingo license, the town collects six per cent of the prize money awarded in each game.

Every year, the town awards 300 bingo licences. As of March 8, the next available bingo license was for June 3.

Though the town has put a hold on giving bingo licenses for December 2004 (pending council's decision on the blackout matter), one organization has reserved two bingos for December. These were issued prior to council's decision to revisit its bingo policy.

Van Nieuwenhuyzen says the town is looking at halting its Monday license (the Town of Inuvik holds its own regular Monday evening game), thus reducing the number of bingos in Inuvik each week from six to five.

The Lottery Committee meets to discuss the matter one more time on March 25 before presenting its recommendations to council.