Bingo World

ANNAPOLIS -- In the wake of revelations of organized crime connections to a commercial bingo operation in Brooklyn Park, Anne Arundel County Executive Robert R. Neall created yesterday a task force to draft new bingo regulations."

County Councilwoman Maureen Lamb wants the council to go on record against a proposed new bridge over the Severn River.Lamb, D-Annapolis, has submitted a resolution similar to one backed by the Annapolis City Council three weeks ago. The previous resolution asked the State Highway Administration to redesign an 80-foot-high bridge that opponents claim would harm the environment and ruin the picturesque skyline.The County Council will take up the issue tonight. No public hearing is scheduled, but Lamb said she has invited people on both sides of the issue to speak.

The owners of Arundel Arena, the Brooklyn Park home of Bingo World, have sued to force Anne Arundel County to consider their bid to operate commercial bingo.The county had advertised in February that it had a sixth commercial bingo license available. In April, the Department of Planning and Code Enforcement turned down Arundel Arena, the sole applicant.In a suit filed Friday in Anne Arundel County Circuit Court, Arundel Arena claims the county inappropriately viewed its application as conditional and as being unresponsive to the county proposal.

In Anne Arundel, one of two Maryland counties to sanction commercial bingo, the game has never been just the benign pastime of grandmothers or the innocent charity of churches and civic groups.Bingo has been a controversial business shadowed by big money and organized crime. That troubled legacy, which has prompted local prosecutors to describe the game as a euphemism for gambling, is growing more complex as the issue enters the political arena.A bill sponsored by the Gary administration that would allow Anne Arundel's five commercial bingo halls to award substantially larger cash prizes was scheduled for a County Council hearing tomorrow night.

The Gary administration wants to allow Anne Arundel's commercial bingo halls to award larger cash prizes as they struggle to stay competitive in a multibillion-dollar national industry.Under a bill presented to the County Council Tuesday night, the county's five commercial bingo halls would be allowed to raise total daily prize money to $15,000 from $10,000. Bingo operators still would be allowed to run an unlimited number of games with prizes of $500 or less.In addition, the operators would be permitted to award prizes worth $50,000 in four special sessions each year compared with the $20,000 limit now allowed.

The owners of the 49er Bingo hall in Brooklyn Park look at themselves, then across town and wonder what they did wrong.John James Snead Jr. and Leonard Buchheit -- two lifelong county residents with squeaky clean records -- have fought unsuccessfully for nearly four years to reopen the 43-year-old Church Street building.Meanwhile, only a few miles away, Stephen B. Paskind, a Florida-based businessman whom federal authorities have linked to a mob money-laundering scheme, has never had to close the doors to Bingo World, the 2,000-seat hall on Belle Grove Road.

The Gary administration wants to allow Anne Arundel's commercial bingo halls to award larger cash prizes as they struggle to stay competitive in a multibillion-dollar national industry.Under a bill presented to the County Council Tuesday night, the county's five commercial bingo halls would be allowed to raise total daily prize money to $15,000 from $10,000. Bingo operators still would be allowed to run an unlimited number of games with prizes of $500 or less.In addition, the operators would be permitted to award prizes worth $50,000 in four special sessions each year compared with the $20,000 limit now allowed.

Anne Arundel County officials have turned down electronic bingo because they don't know how to regulate it and are afraid the game's high-tech version would be open to manipulation.Two years ago, FortuNet Inc., located in Las Vegas, started seeking a county license to lease computer programs and players' computer screens to any of the five commercial bingo halls in Anne Arundel.This summer, county licensing officials decided the technology was simply too advanced for local regulators to be able to apply the necessary controls, said Anne Hatcher, chief of licensing.

A Circuit Court judge has ruled that the county was wrong in denying renewal of a bingo parlor license to a Florida businessman with alleged ties to organized crime.Judge Bruce C. Williams decided that the county Board of Appeals improperly applied county codes in denying Stephen Paskind a license to continue operating Bingo World on Belle Grove Road in Glen Burnie.The county has been trying to get Mr. Paskind out of the business since 1989, when it denied him renewal of his license to operate because of his company's alleged ties to organized crime.

County officials have proposed a bill they hope would prevent organized crime from infiltrating commercial bingo operations.A task force appointed by County Executive Robert R. Neall is reviewing the bill, which was drafted by Deputy County Attorney David Plymyer on the committee's recommendation.The task force hopes to submit the bill to the County Council in September, said Anne Hatcher, license administrator for the county Department of Inspections and Permits and a committee member."We'retrying to comply with what the county executive wanted, which was toreview the existing regulations and come up with something a little more substantial," Hatcher said.