California betting ballot initiative; US optimists back legal betting

Sports betting could be on the November 2020 election ballot in California if a coalition of local card rooms and unidentified online gambling operators gets its way.

On Monday, Russell Lowery, president of Sacramento-based consultants Competitive Edge Advantage Inc., submitted a proposed revision to California’s gambling laws that would allow for legal sports betting in the Golden State.

Specifically, Lowery’s proposed Gaming Fairness and Accountability Act would empower California legislators to “authorize banking and percentage games including and not limited to sports wagering.” Lowery aims to get the roughly 500k signatures needed to the proposed constitutional amendment on this November’s ballot and then let voters have their say.

Lowery told the Los Angeles Times that he wasn’t yet at liberty to divulge the names of the parties he approached about supporting the initiative, saying only that he’d spoken with “in-state gaming interests, out-of-state gaming interests and the sports leagues” and that he’d found “enough interest to try and build a coalition” they’re calling Californians for Sports Betting.