Texas Lottery eliminates Lotto bonus ball
Updated Feb. 28, 2005, 8:02 am
Everything old is new again at the Texas Lottery, where commissioners voted Monday to ditch the unpopular Lotto Texas bonus ball and return to the style abandoned three years ago due to sagging sales.
Starting in late April, players will choose six numbers between 1 and 54 rather than five numbers between 1 and 44 and one bonus ball from 1 to 44. That will return the odds of winning the jackpot to 1 in 25.8 million, down from 1 in 47.8 million with the bonu ...
Feb 28, 2006, 7:25 am - - Lottery News forum
Texas lottery players want to get rid of 'bonus ball'
Players are letting the Texas Lottery Commission know in sometimes blunt and colorful language that they want the bonus ball to be bounced out of the Lotto game.
The panel that oversees lottery operations is expected to vote next week on a proposal to return the game to a format resembling the one that was thrown out a little more than three years ago because officials were concerned about its profitability. But they ran into a problem when the new game proved to be about 30 percent less pr ...
Feb 24, 2006, 10:24 am - - Lottery News forum
Ex-lottery employee claims bias complaint led to firing
A former Texas Lottery employee who was fired in June shortly after receiving an excellent performance evaluation has sued the $3.5 billion agency, claiming she was fired because she complained about national origin discrimination.
Former administrative assistant Cynthia Suarez, who is Hispanic, claimed in the lawsuit filed Thursday that the lottery's human resources director often criticized, belittled and yelled at her in a hostile and belligerent manner. She also claimed she was deni ...
Jan 31, 2006, 8:15 am - - Lottery News forum
Interim Texas Lottery Director Hired
One of the original commissioners to oversee the Texas lottery was called back to service Friday, this time to act as the temporary executive director of the troubled agency because officials have been unable to find someone to permanently fill the job, which has been open for six months.Anthony Sadberry, a Houston lawyer who gave up his private practice two months ago to become an assistant Texas attorney general, will take over the day-to-day operation of the lottery on Tuesday. Unlike his pas ...
Jan 16, 2006, 6:44 am - - Lottery News forum
2005 a trying year for Texas Lottery chairman
Tom Clowe says he was never much of a gambling man, but he was willing to take his chances when he asked Gov. George W. Bush in 1998 to give him an opportunity to serve the state in a volunteer capacity. I said to Governor Bush: I'm ready to do public service now. Give me the worst job that you've got,' Clowe recalled in a recent interview. And, man, he did! Bush appointed Clowe in November 1998 to the board that oversees the Texas Lottery Commission, which was still reeling from a string of ...
Jan 2, 2006, 7:42 am - - Lottery News forum
Heflin won't take Texas Lottery director job
Former state Rep. Talmadge Heflin ended his flirtation with becoming director of the Texas lottery Thursday and decided instead to file for the House district in Houston that he lost by a scant 16 votes in 2004. I had made the decision to run for the House about three weeks ago, but I put it off after being asked to apply for the lottery position, said Heflin, a 22-year legislative veteran who headed the budget-writing House Appropriations Committee before being upset by Democratic newcomer Hub ...
Dec 16, 2005, 6:37 am - - Lottery News forum
Impartial choice promised for Texas Lottery chief
The chairman of the Texas Lottery Commission said Wednesday that politics will play no part in whether a powerful ex-lawmaker is hired to run the beleaguered state agency.Former state Rep. Talmadge Heflin, a Houston Republican who lost his bid for a 12th term by a scant 16 votes last year, was an 11th-hour entry into the hunt to replace former director Reagan Greer after Lottery Commission Chairman C. Thomas Clowe encouraged him to apply last month. At least eight other applicants had made it to ...
Dec 9, 2005, 1:30 pm - - Lottery News forum
Lost lottery ticket worth $25,000 returned to owner
Mike Sargent doesn't put much stock in karma. Luck isn't his thing either.But in getting back a lost winning lottery ticket worth $25,000, a little of both may have come into play along with some divine intervention.Like the lead character in the new NBC sitcom My Name is Earl, Sargent lost the scratch-off ticket moments after he realized he'd hit the jackpot and, through several incredible coincidences, had it returned days later.In the television show, losing the ticket inspires Earl, a down ...
Dec 9, 2005, 6:57 am - - Lottery News forum
Texas Lottery Commission chair betting on future
When word spread in June that the Texas Lottery Commission approved jackpots it couldn't afford to make, chairman C. Tom Clowe Jr.'s term on the commission had officially expired months earlier.The retired Waco businessman who launched his career in trucking and has spent 51 years of marriage living in 34 different towns faced one last duty before fully returning to retirement: overseeing the troubled agency's bid to win back public trust.Beginning the eighth year of his now open-ended term, Clo ...
Nov 30, 2005, 12:30 pm - - Lottery News forum
Texas Lottery to change Lotto game back to 6/54 format
Texas lottery commissioners moved one step closer Friday to returning the Lotto Texas game to its original format by signing off on a plan to bounce the so-called bonus ball from the format that decides how the multimillion-dollar jackpots are won.Meanwhile, the two sitting commissioners who oversee lottery operations deferred a decision on who will be hired to run the agency, which generates $1 billion a year for the state. But both offered high praise for former state Rep. Talmadge Heflin, a H ...
Nov 19, 2005, 9:20 am - - Lottery News forum
