LAS VEGAS (KLAS) – The month of March marks the beginning of Problem Gambling Awareness Month which is a nationwide grassroots campaign, that seeks to increase public awareness of problem gambling and promote prevention, treatment, and recovery services.
Some advocates believe Nevada is falling behind when comes to the battle over gambling addiction.
Elizabeth Evans is learning to become an addiction therapist at the International Problem Gambling Center and not long ago, she said she battled her own demons.
“I don’t want anybody to ever suffer the way I did,” Evans expressed. “I turned to drugs, alcohol, and problem gambling and I was on the streets for about four years, I lost everything, basically.”
Evans described feeling helpless, hopeless, and not understanding that there was a way out during that dark period in her life. However, now she believes she is part of the way out.
As gambling becomes more accepted and accessible the International Problem Gambling Center is seeing more patients.
“What happens here is I think a space of hope,” International Problem Gambling Center Executive Director Stephanie Goodman said. “We’re on the precipice of an epidemic if we don’t really start taking care of it now and letting people know they can get help.”
In December, The Nevada Gaming Control Board reported a record $1.4 billion in revenue.
In all 2023, the state brought in nearly $11 billion. However, while the casino industry moves forward resources for gambling addiction have not kept up.
“It’s a pretty, lonely feeling to have a gambling addiction,” Nevada Council on Problem Gambling Counselor Ted Hartwell described. “We should be a little bit dismayed that we have long since fallen behind most other states that do have regulations.”
Last year, Nevada lawmakers approved $2.2 million for Nevada’s problem gambling fund.
However, even the state’s reports acknowledged investment in counseling “falls well behind several other states.”
“We are still probably funded in this state less than half of what we need to accomplish the state’s own strategic plan,” Hartwell added.
“Everyone talks about F1, the Super Bowl, all of these gaming revenues. The state needs to do better to carve out a piece of that to help people that have a problem,” Goodman said.
The money would go towards treatment, it would also help with awareness.
Advocates believe gambling addiction should be introduced as any other addiction to adults and children.
“This is something we ought to be teaching our middle school kids,” UNLV’s International Gaming Institute Distinguished Fellow Alan Feldman said. “It is the most hidden addiction.”
He believes a key part of awareness is finding out the scale of gambling addiction in Nevada. The only problem, the last major study was more than 20 years ago.
“What we don’t know about problem gambling, I have to believe, is in its own way, as big or bigger than what we do know,” Feldman said.
Casino companies do contribute to problem gambling services.
For example, in December, MGM Resorts donated $350,000 for a research project on addiction. Nearly 30 years ago, Caesars Entertainment started the first addiction hotline. Advocates just think more is needed.
“We have more clients than the state can fund us for. We are in a position where the legislature and people who make decisions are educated,” Goodman added.
For now, counselors do what they can for those in need.
Many of them have been there before.
“On the other side of it, it’s so much more rewarding. To understand, I can have my life back,” Evans said.
For the next legislative session, advocates plan to ask lawmakers to carve out money specifically for gambling addiction. The Problem Gambling Center said 44% of its patients never bet again.
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