(Click for slide presentation- the 2004 election may be over but the reality isn't)

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Following the 2004 near victory for keeping the money in Nebraska, 2006 saw Boyd Casinos of Las Vegas try to edge out local gaming forces and run its own petitions.  In response some of the local gaming forces circulated a petition to at least modernize keno.  The Boyd Petition was stopped in the courts because Boyd had not waited the  required 3 years.  The effort to modernize keno failed because it did not have broad appeal.  2006 proved to be a pro-gaming train wreck setting back the cause of conserving Nebraska resources years.  

Now there comes a beacon at the end of the tunnel from a most unexpected place, Norfolk, Nebraska.  Norfolk is known as a conservative, Republican, fundamentally religious community that had long scorned gambling.  In 2007, polling indicated that any effort to introduce even a modest form of gambling, keno, would fail miserably at the polls.  Then in less than a year the world changed and in May 2008 Norfolk voters approved by 58% majority an expansion of gambling in that city.  The policy reversal did not stop there.  The normally conservative City government sought bids to conduct its new keno game.  Not only did the City Government set up a keno operation, it employed a contractor that promised to use sophisticated marketing to get the people of Norfolk to gamble and gamble with intensity.  Contractors offering a milder approach were rejected.  The selected contractor, confident of its ability to rev-up gambling in Norfolk threw in a $100,000 bonus.  The City is planning on using its big new revenue stream to enhance recreational facilities.