On a good night, players crowd the poker room at Salem’s Rockingham Park, wagering thousands of dollars on Texas Hold ‘Em, 7-card Stud and Omaha Hi-Lo. It costs at least $20 for a seat at a table; some games require $250 to buy in. Dozens of tables spread across the space that can hold up to 85.

This is the face of charitable gaming in New Hampshire.

While state lawmakers debate gambling – prompted by an effort to legalize slot machines – an evening at Rockingham Park shows that millions of gambling dollars are already changing hands in New Hampshire.

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Specific guidelines for charities trade one set of problems for another.   

Officers with the state’s newly created Gaming Control Division swooped into Kendallville this week, arresting people and confiscating cash and equipment allegedly connected to illegal gambling.

But if LaShonda Wilcox’s Para- dise Billiards had simply been a bit more “charitable,” she might be counting her share of the take today – not facing up to three years in prison.

The rise, fall and rising again of Fort Wayne’s Hold ‘em Palace – and its imminent marriage to the Jaycees – proves it.

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Although a company wanting to run legal poker games has found locations in Milford and Brookline, it’s still betting it can find a suitable location in the city.

“We’ve always been interested in Nashua. We just want to find the right place,” said James Rafferty, president of New Hampshire Charitable Gaming.

That right place looks like it might be on Northeastern Boulevard.

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For Immediate Release
Contact: Rich Muny, PPA KY State Director
September 17, 2007
KY@theppa.org

PRESS RELEASE

Friday, July 6, 2007, marks the opening day of the Main Event at the World Series of Poker, the world’s richest and most prestigious competitive event.Many of the competitors in the WSOP will be from Washington and most of the Washington entrants will have qualified on the internet, thereby committing a felony under this state’s internet poker ban (or, more broadly, as discussed in the Complaint, internet gambling ban) in order to win a chance at poker immortality. (more…)

Dear Washington State PPA Members,

I wanted to let you know that lawmakers in your state are taking the right steps to roll back the new Washington law that makes it a criminal offense to play poker on the Internet.  The Poker Players Alliance supports the bill introduced by State Representative Chris Strow House Bill 1243 which would remove the criminal penalties from playing games of skill online like poker.
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