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http://www.seacoastonline.com/news/01302005/news/61828.htm
Housing authority bans elderly’s bingo game
By Susan Morse
[email protected]SEABROOK – Quarter bingo games played by a handful of seniors in the local elderly housing complex have ended, as the Housing Authority determined they constitute illegal gambling.
Housing Authority Chairman Paul Kelley and Vice Chairman Paul Moulton confirmed the housing board of five members voted unanimously to put a stop to the bingo. The games were played in a central meeting room of the town’s senior housing units, Ocean Mist and Seabreeze Village, on Railroad Avenue.Selectmen Chairman Asa Knowles, holding a meeting of the board in the same room on Wednesday, Jan. 19, voiced his disgust at the decision.
Games were played for a quarter, Knowles said.
“They could play all day and wouldn’t lose $4,” he said.
Fewer than a dozen residents played each week, but it was good social interaction for many who didn’t get out to talk to people, said Paul Essigmann, who works in building maintenance.
The small group played its last game sometime before Thanksgiving.
“It kills their little spot in life to socialize on a Thursday,” he said.
Even Kelley indicated he hated to lay down the law, but he had no choice, he said.
On Jan. 1, the state, through a Senate bill passed last year, authorized the transfer of the administration of bingo games from the Sweepstakes Commission to the Pari-Mutuel Commission.
The conventional wisdom, Kelley said, was the Sweepstakes Commission’s job was the lottery and that bingo was better administered by Pari-Mutuel, a commission formed in 1933 as the racing commission.
Kelley is director of the Pari-Mutuel Commission.
No law changed when he became the overseer of all legalized gambling in the state, he said. Only the agency of enforcement was different.
Bingo games require a state license, with fees payable to the state of an estimated $1 a game.
“When I reviewed the rules and laws, I realized the seniors also needed a license,” Kelley said. “I have to be unbiased.”
The Housing Authority’s five members met in August and all voted to end the games.
“We can’t allow things that are against the law that take place on public property,” Vice Chairman Fred Moulton said. “We certainly have an obligation to be legal.”
Kelley said if someone wants to pursue reinstating the bingo games, all they have to do is call the senior housing’s property manager, Paul Stewart of Stewart Property Management in Bedford, to ask him to file a request with the Pari-Mutuel Commission.
That person can’t be him, Kelley said.
“Maybe the ladies are allowed their 25 cent games,” he said.
None of the former bingo players could be reached for comment.
Seabreeze Village resident Gladys Ross said she knew about the games and was angry they had been taken away.
“What harm is that?” she asked, “letting a few old ladies play again.”
‘
Even Kelley indicated he hated to lay down the law, but he had no choice, he said. ‘Yeah I’m sure he just had to come on in and show who the alpha male is.
this is the exact kind of thing that should be a heavy weight is the decision process of electing officials who are in position to either begin the necessary process to change these laws, or that are in a position to “overlook” it if they really wanted to.
It seems we are destined to endure the huge amount of BS, red tape and incompetence of our elected officials but when it comes down to a situation where IF THEY REALLY WANTED IT; they could find a way to make it work without turning a mole hill into a mountain: where there is no victim, in fact, there is only incredible gain in respect to making the last days of these elders, days that might be more than (for most) a lonely, depressed state of being where all that remains in the way of hope is that they are allowed to cherish each and every day in the short time that remains to them.
Its sickening.
