Colorado’s freshman board overseeing the state’s $110 million charitable gaming industry on Friday created a committee to tackle issues raised in a Denver Gazette investigation that exposed, among other issues, poor supervision and illegal operators.
The Colorado Charitable Gaming Board, in only its second meeting since the Denver Gazette series ran in October, unanimously formed a public relations committee whose first task will be to review the newspaper’s findings and potentially make recommendations for change.
“There were significant allegations in there and it gets back to our specific purpose,” board member Tom Downey said in proposing the committee and its approach. “There were a number of things that jumped out at me and it’s important to get a sense of what it said. Are there things that raise alarms and are there things we can do?”
The Denver Gazette’s findings included evidence that convicted felons were certified as games managers, a specific prohibition by law. The newspaper also documented how some charities that rely on bingo to raise funds have devised ways to remunerate the volunteers who conduct those games, also prohibited by law…