Gamblers sipping beer at the East Baltimore bar have plenty of options. There's a Keno monitor in one corner. A vending machine offers scratch-off lottery tickets in another. Screens show horses running in another. And against one wall stands a bank of four video poker machines.
The first three types of games present legal opportunities to win or lose cash. But the row of video poker machines are supposed to be for amusement only: If you win, you aren't supposed to get money back.
But seasoned gamblers and even industry representatives say many bars like this one pay out cash to the winners, though such transactions are made in backrooms, or sometimes even bathrooms.
With a nod to reality, city officials are considering a new taxing system that would take in much more money from poker machines than is now collected. They're proposing a $3,000-per-machine annual license fee for bar owners, which would replace the current 10 percent amusement tax that now generates an estimated $522 per machine.
It's extra cash - an additional $3 million to $5 million yearly - the city could use to restore cuts to rec centers, pool hours and library hours.
Officials insist the plan does not amount to legalizing the devices. But machine owners say it would be unfair for the city to collect so much money and then continue occasional gambling crackdowns and machine seizures.
"That is the biggest question," said Larry Bershtein, the president of the Maryland Amusement Music Operators Association, which represents about 20 machine vendors statewide. "You take the $3,000, and tomorrow you come in and take my machine, too? I don't have an answer to that."
Officially, gaming is illegal in Baltimore. The city treats these machines as benign bar games, putting them in the same legal category as pinball machines and pool tables. However, City Councilman Robert W. Curran strongly suspects that many of these machines aren't registered with the city and taxes on them aren't paid. A 2006 Abell Foundation report determined that underreporting causes the state to lose $15 million annually.
To capture some of that money, Curran has offered the licensing bill that's caught attention from Baltimore Mayor Sheila Dixon. The legislation exempts the video poker machines from the amusement tax.
