California lottery shorted schools by $36 million, auditor says

Comment #8

Cmoore50 — Mon, 02 Mar 2020 05:07:33 GMT

Lottery officials have been partying at these hotels for 4 years running up the bill while holding money back from the schools. How far will the auditor take this? We all know that the lottery money isn't spent according to their pretty little spreadsheets.

Comment #7

winterhug — Sat, 29 Feb 2020 13:25:45 GMT

I agree..

Comment #6

KY Floyd — Sat, 29 Feb 2020 02:19:38 GMT

Amen. They should just stop wasting money on promotions of any sort. The sooner they stop wasting the money on advertising the sooner they'll be able to give the money to education.

Comment #5

winterhug — Fri, 28 Feb 2020 14:10:09 GMT

It certainly did NOT help that the California lottery gave 212,500 dollars worth of lottery scratch-off tickets, FREE to The Ellen Show during December 2019. The loss has most likely contributed to the 36 million dollar revenue loss for funding California public education

Comment #4

KY Floyd — Fri, 28 Feb 2020 03:18:00 GMT

Why would they not just have a specific percentage based on GROSS sales.

Because the net profit isn't a fixed percentage of gross sales. Requiring a fixed percentage of sales could mean that the lottery could be forced to cut costs in order to have enough to meet the required percentage. Obviously there's nothing wrong with cutting costs, but how you cut costs matters. They could cut costs by 75% by reducing the payouts by 80 or 85%, but that might cut sales by 80 to 90%. Next thing you know... [ More ]

Comment #3

cottoneyedjoe — Fri, 28 Feb 2020 00:02:34 GMT

Here is the full report on the CA auditor website: https://www.auditor.ca.gov/reports/2019-112/index.html

In section 3 under Sections they really go after the State Controller Office, lol. The back and forth in the responses section is also a good read. Mostly it's just another interagency duck measuring contest, but Betty Yee (controller) is an elected official and Elaine Howle (auditor) is appointed, so it's mostly Betty's behind on the line. The question now is, will the lottery pay the $3... [ More ]

Comment #2

Fabs — Thu, 27 Feb 2020 12:37:37 GMT

So they don't believe the children are our future

Comment #1

DELotteryPlyr — Thu, 27 Feb 2020 11:21:24 GMT

law requires the lottery to provide as much funding possible for education after accounting for operating expenses and to increase funding every year based on the agency's profits.

Why would they not just have a specific percentage based on GROSS sales. That way forcing the agency to figure out how to operate 'around' the payment to the schools, and guarantying the schools get the maximum amount each year.

California lottery shorted schools by $36 million, auditor says

Lottery Post — Thu, 27 Feb 2020 09:35:29 GMT

The California lottery skimped on giving $36 million in revenue to fund public education and spent $720,000 on food and travel expenses without considering cheaper options, the state auditor said in a report made public Tuesday.

Sales from scratch and lotto tickets have funded public schools and colleges in California since 1985. But the lottery should have accounted for an increase in profits during the fiscal year that ended in June 2018 by turning over an additional $36 million to finance