NASHVILLE, Tenn. — Tennessee Senate Minority Leader Jim Kyle, D-Memphis, is urging lawmakers to deal with the state's "insolvent" lottery-funded college scholarship fund.
Sen. Kyle's comment came after a Senate panel refused to adopt his plan to plug a $13 million program shortfall.
"This is the first step to reducing scholarships and denying accessibility for thousands of Tennessee students who depend on the lottery scholarship as their sole opportunity to attend college," Sen. Kyle said in a news release Thursday. "This inaction threatens the ability to keep our promise to these students. The time to act is now."
His bill would shift from $56 million and $91.4 million in lottery funds, set aside two years ago for the $90 million Energy Efficient Schools Initiative, back to the scholarship fund's reserve. The initiative, a GOP brainchild, was intended to provide construction grants or loans to K-12 schools to promote energy efficiency and savings.
Sen. Kyle's bill failed Wednesday in the Senate Education Committee on a 4-4-1 party line vote, with all four Republicans voting "no" and a fifth Republican abstaining. All four Democrats, including Sen. Andy Berke, D-Chattanooga, voted for it.
Committee Chairman Delores Gresham, R-Somerville, did not return a call Thursday afternoon.
With the scholarship fund shortfall projected to hit $30 million or more in the fiscal year beginning July 1, the Senate and House speakers have appointed lawmakers to a task force that will tackle long-term problems.
Sen. Kyle argued before the committee that more immediate action was needed and that the bill should be sent to the Finance Committee. He sought to portray the issue as a collision between the lottery's original main purpose -- college scholarships -- and the relatively new K-12 energy efficiency program.
TVA Senior Vice President of Marketing Jim Keiffer, an Energy Efficient Schools Council member, told senators that "we have made a lot of progress with the program," noting that more than $9.5 million in grants to various schools have been "promised and are in the process of being moved as we speak."
Moreover, he said, funding for energy efficiency loans also has been promised, although rules regulating the process still are being finalized. A $3 million federal grant, meanwhile, depends on matching funds from the energy efficiency fund, he said.
"If this bill by Sen. Kyle passes, what does it do?" Sen. Jim Tracy, R-Shelbyville, who had helped champion the K-12 energy efficiency program, asked Mr. Keiffer.
About $45 million could disappear, Mr. Keiffer said.
"There's a lot of dollars and a lot of schools which haven't received any funds yet," he said. "As I understand it, $45 million goes away. So we obviously wouldn't be able to do as many projects."
Taking the money away "would be quite confusing, I would think" for local school districts, state education department lobbyist Bruce Opie warned.
Who would have thought that Tennessee would have any problems with their management of Lottery Money......????? well why don't they sell a lottery raffel ticket that would directly go to their money problem.....beaudad....
Thats why all the repeats,to raise money...People are waking up in Tennessee ,no win no play here.Or should I say (speaking for myself)
Have live feed over the internet so players can watch draws in real time. Live feed similar to a glorified webcam could be nowhere near as expensive as televised draws.
I'd like to see them stop allocating money they don't have yet, period. Stop making promises based on projected income. Allocate after you have the cash in hand. And as Konane said, go back to the ball machines and people will stop going out of state to avoid the computers they so disdain.
We need new blood in the TEL. Somebody willing to take bold steps and not just play follow the leader with all the other states' failed strategies.
And our legislature needs to stop spending money they don't have.
OMG Georiga threw a 444 today,georiga people are so lucky...see,what I'm talking about.Enough said!
You will hit the MM & PB twice before a state politician does anything that makes sense or is in the best interest of the public...power & money has the worse effect on people more often than not.
Wonderful comments here so far today,,,BRING MS DEE TO TENNESSEE___BRING MS DEE TO TENNESSEE
Anyone who buys lottery tickets in TN is a dummy...Oh wait ridge runner lives and buys tickets in TN..Yeah anybbody named ridge runner..That's it...
Hey tiggs,
I think I heard you mention playing 3 Line Lotto up there in the land of extremely close families.
News Flash: COMPUTER!
Same goes for Kicker.
You don't have to darken in COMPUTER tiggs can see..tiggs had 5 out of 6 numberrs about 6 weeks ago and won 516.00..Missed 265,000.00 bye one number..Lot of Jack Daniels in them numbers..Oh wait tiggs don't drink what a shame..tiggs don't complain about COMPUTER drawing and if you can find a post where he did you got a bott...oops never mind your so trcky you just might pull one up from someone else and put tiggs name on it..tiggs is to smart for ole ridgey........NEXT!!!.......
Solution #1 get rid of the CEO. She is not player friendly.
Solution #2 get rid of the computers.
Solution #3 put more than 4 top prizes on the scratchers.
Even the 2nd and 3rd tier prizes suck.
I will not buy them because of that.
The end.
Those top prizes look good on paper,but I've said it all along and wil always say it ...PUT MORE PRIZES WITH LOWER AMOUNTS SO EVERY ONE GETS A CHANCE TO WIN A LITTLE SOMETHING>>>WHY WONT THEY WAKE UP.I know when ,when the Tennessee lottery crashes......Pcurtis you are so right about #1 and if you think the computer has anything to do with it you are all wrong....They play what makes the state more money,,,,not to us.The average payout in Tennessee is around $30,000 and below on almost all draws.Wait and see what they payout will be when the 911 falls or the 789 at night,so dont tell me people dont play this sorry lottery,they do.Whewwww,what a shame .....we got caught up in her web....
Take their new 2 dollar scratcher Lucky 8's and Aces for instance.
4 28,888 dollar prizes!
58 588 dollar prizes!
229 288 dollar prizes!
TN has over 4700 retailers the prize level stinks
The odds of winning 1 of the top 3 prizes is way up there.
A player would be nuts to play this game.
I agree pcurtis.
Unfortunately they know that scratchers are the hottest thing in the lottery and they're going to gouge the hell out of us until we stop playing them.
They'd give us better prizes and odds if we demanded it but they know people will never stick together and demand it by not playing.
this made me think of something...TECHNICALLY i dont know what´s each state population but if the state of Tennese had 5 million people and the state of Alabama has: 10 million people and the state of Tennesse has: 10,000 students on a lottery scholarship and the state of Alabama has: 20,000 they are both equal, they are both doing good...per pecentage of the population...That´s what i think they should be looking at when comparing themselves to other states...
Let me see if I get this right. After robbing the lottory fund to pay for construction projects, a Democrat wants to put the money back to pay for scholarships. Is that about right?
Here is a list of all the state lotteries showing population, per capita spending, and annual sales.
http://www.ohiolottery.com/profits/compare.html
Tennessee is at the bottom because they didn't release their annual sales so it's impossible to compare it to any other lottery. The TN lottery won't release their Mega Millions sales either.
My question is..........Why not??
i often flashback to a glorious time when tennessee had a fabulous lottery.see back then everything was so good and they managed to screw it all up in the summer of 2007 by making a mistake that has came back to bite them in the ass big time.RNG don't pay.
I agree MIKE. When it comes to RNG's we need to rage against the machine.
Remember those rubber ducky tanks they used to have at carnivals and such where you'd grab a duck out of the water and look on the bottom to see what your prize was? I think they ought to use that system for picking the winning numbers. They could have blindfolded little kids or drunk hillbillys pick the ducks out and get the numbers. I think that would go a long way to restore faith in the TN Lottery.
Are you reading this Ms. Hargrove?
Rubber Duckies!
(<---- pretend those chickens are ducks)
LOL
His bill would shift from $56 million and $91.4 million in lottery funds, set aside two years ago for the $90 million Energy Efficient Schools Initiative, back to the scholarship fund's reserve. The initiative, a GOP brainchild, was intended to provide construction grants or loans to K-12 schools to promote energy efficiency and savings.
Sen. Kyle's bill failed Wednesday in the Senate Education Committee on a 4-4-1 party line vote, with all four Republicans voting "no" and a fifth Republican abstaining. All four Democrats, including Sen. Andy Berke, D-Chattanooga, voted for it.
One thing I know for sure from living here..eventually the money will just "disappear". That money was actually set aside for their "friends" who own businesses dealing with energy or construction. Or who are smart enough to just start a business dealing with energy or construction. They are just waiting until they can get in a position to parcel the money out to their cronies.