West Virginia Lottery director John
Musgrave said the water-contamination emergency led to a dip in revenues.
Musgrave said Thursday lottery
officials were compiling the final numbers but the Mardis Gras Casino in Kanawha County
Mardis Gras endured water issues
that were related to both the contamination emergency—which began Jan. 9 with a
chemical spill on the Elk River —and the
polar vortex that created sub-zero temps a few days before the spill.
“They had some revenue losses,”
Musgrave said.
Community bars and Hotspot-like
businesses licensed to operate video lottery machines also took a hit.
Musgrave said Thursday he’ll know
soon how much money was lost.
“We’ll compare those days with the
days of the previous months and kind of get an idea of what the loss will be,”
he said.
December revenue numbers released
by the Lottery Thursday show Racetrack Video Lottery dropped another $6 million
from December 2012 revenue. Racetrack Video Lottery was down approximately $30
million this fiscal year.
The financial numbers show Limited
Video Lottery and Table Games revenues were also down $10 million each so far
this budget year.
The lottery reported $664 million in revenues through the first
six months of the previous budget year, while this year total revenues stand at
$612 million.
