SAN FRANCISCO – California drivers can now play the lottery at the pump through a new program slowing rolling out across the state, reports the San Francisco Chronicle.
Play at the Pump allows drivers to buy up to $20 worth of Quick Pick tickets at the same time they purchase gas and put both purchases on the same credit card. The news source notes that since 1985, California has maintained a cash-only policy for ticket purchases to prevent “overspending by the poor and overindulging by gamblers.”
Rev. James Butler of the California Coalition Against Gambling Expansion in Sacramento told the news source that an expanded state lottery “continues to exploit the poor, urban [residents] and ethnic minorities,” adding, “If this was a tax, it would be the most regressive tax increase any state could do.”
Alex Traverso, a spokesman for the California Lottery, said that complaints such as Butler’s are valid concerns. However, the state lottery has “put controls in place [for the gas pump game] to make people skew to responsibility and security.”
For now, the gas pump game is available at only 87 stations in the state, Traverso continued, noting that most are within the Sacramento and Los Angeles areas. Once the game gets to 100 stations, “we’ll take a look and decide what to do next,” he explained.
Under California Lottery rules, a player can spend up to $20 a day or $50 a week buying tickets at the gas pump. A player also is required to insert a valid driver’s license or state ID card into the pump for age verification.
The news source notes that Sunny Oaks Valero is the only San Francisco Bay Area gas station participating in Play at the Pump. “It’s being used and we’re getting a lot of nice feedback,” said Andre Wilson, the station’s owner. “We’ve had it in for a couple of weeks and our customers like it.”
Wilson added that he wanted to be the first to offer the program in his market so he could bring in more business. “We get people coming by to play who aren’t our regular customers. … I’ve got no complaints.”