The West Virginia House Judiciary Committee has passed the West Virginia Responsible Gaming and Research Act (RGRA), according to a recent Yahoo News report.
The bill will advance to the West Virginia House for consideration.
Speaker of the House Roger Hanshaw sponsored the bill, along with Representative Shawn Fluharty. Hanshaw also serves as the National Council of Legislators from Gaming States’ President.
The RGRA was drafted to require gambling operators and intermediaries from across the state to submit anonymized gambling data to West Virginia University.
In turn, the university will collaborate with the State Lottery Commission’s Department of Human Services to conduct research that will provide a better understanding of problematic and addictive gambling behaviors.
The research will aid future lawmakers in coming up with safe gambling solutions, the report said.
Sheila Moran, who serves as First Choice Services’ Director of Marketing and Communication, told Yahoo News that research of this kind is overdue.
She commented, “The last national major prevalence study was done in 1999. Now, think about how much gambling has expanded in since 1999. Quite a bit. So that’s the best statistics we have.
“There’s never been a prevalence study done here in West Virginia.”
Moran went on to explain that the research could provide more comprehensive data.
She said in closing, “Most of the research that we have in the gambling addiction field is based on self-report, and we all know that sometimes people aren’t forthright in self-report.
"Therefore, I think it would be very interesting to have the actual data from how people are truly behaving online, how they’re spending money.
"We know there are certain tells in the data that will indicate problem gambling, and we would really like to know how much of that we’re dealing with that would help us, help us know how to target our efforts.”
