Nebraska Casinos Set Monthly Revenue Records: But Will It Ease Property Taxes?

The cacophony heard from the slot machines at WarHorse Casino in Omaha is the sound of property tax relief for Nebraska taxpayers.

In the month of May alone, the casino contributed more than $1 million to the state’s Property Tax Credit Cash Fund.

Across the state, revenues have grown steadily at other casinos in Lincoln, Grand Island, and Columbus with new locations on the horizon in other cities.

Lance Morgan, the CEO of WarHorse Gaming, doesn’t see the growth of the industry slowing down any time soon.

“Grand Island just opened a larger facility, Columbus is functional, Ogallala is going to open one soon, South Sioux will open one and Omaha will continue to take market share,” he said. “So what you're seeing in property tax relief is maybe half of what it's going to be when it's all said and done.”

Casino gambling was legalized in Nebraska in 2020. Voters also approved an initiative that taxes the casinos at 20% of their gross gambling revenue.

Of that gaming tax collected, 70% goes to the Property Tax Credit Cash Fund, 2.5% goes to the state’s general fund and another 2.5% goes to a fund that provides resources to help compulsive gamblers. The cities and counties where the casinos are located split the remaining 25% of the gaming tax.

Casey Ricketts is the executive director of the Nebraska Racing and Gaming Commission, which oversees the gaming tax collection. When she began that role in 2022, she was the sixth person hired at the commission. Today, there are 32 employees.

“I always affectionately like to say we're flying the plane as we're building it,” she said. “So I think that you're going to see more growth. We're going to have more staff here, especially at our properties right now.”

In May, more than $4.8 million of gaming tax was collected across all four active casinos, with nearly $3.4 million of that going to the property tax credit cash fund. That marked the third straight month of record revenue for the state’s casinos.

Morgan said that’s good for Nebraska but he hopes to take a greater market share from across the Missouri River in Iowa. Casinos in that state have generated more than $12 billion dollars since they’ve opened – revenue that Morgan wants to see stay in his home state.

“It's not just $12 billion in revenue that's gone across, it's all the taxes that we didn't get, it's all the jobs that we didn't get, and there's all the ancillary things that happen when you have an economic activity of this scale,” he said.

tate Sen. Brad von Gillern of Omaha chairs the Legislature’s Revenue Committee and said gambling could be taking tax revenues away from other entertainment options.

“I just don't see that it is a positive financial impact to the state, because those dollars were going somewhere before, and they'd be going those places if gambling were not here,” he said.

Von Gillern said most people won’t see noticeable savings from the gaming tax. For example, a person who pays eight thousand dollars annually would see a reduction of less than $50 in their property tax bill based on current revenues.

“It's not moving the needle yet,” he said. “For that number to get to where it's substantially impacting property tax relief would be, frankly, in my view, a frightening amount of gambling revenue.”

During this year’s legislative session, von Gillern led an effort to stop a proposed constitutional amendment to allow for mobile sports betting over concerns about its negative social impacts. Currently, the practice is legal in 30 states including Kansas, Iowa and Colorado.

If the Legislature fails to act, Morgan said he will work with other industry leaders to get the signatures necessary to get the issue on the ballot.

“If we have to do that, we will, but we were hoping that the state would just do it,” he said. “70 some percent of the people support it. We've done the polls, I mean, it will pass. I think sometimes the Legislature is a little bit paternalistic.”

If mobile sports betting is legalized, Ricketts said the Racing and Gaming Commission will be ready.

“We've always kind of been behind the curve, like trying to get ahead of things, but with mobile wagering, not even here, I think for once, we're a little ahead of the curve, because we've had the ability to talk to the other jurisdictions,” she said.

It is estimated that the tax collected from mobile sports betting could bring in anywhere between $6 million and $35 million annually in additional property tax relief.