by Russ Pullium

Billboards may boast about the great benefits of casinos for Indiana, but the gambling industry has pitched a different message to the Hoosier state’s General Assembly’s Interim Study on Gaming.

Industry executives are begging for tax breaks for casinos and horse tracks. The riverboats want an option for land-based casinos so they can move off the water to better locations. The recession has hit the gambling businesses as it has many others. A Michigan casino is cutting into Lake County riverboat revenue.

The study committee will be tugged in several directions in making recommendations to the General Assembly.

Tax breaks should be out of order. Most other businesses are suffering from the recession.

Yes, casinos are taxed more than other businesses, but the operators knew that from the start. The higher taxes reflect the toxic nature of the industry. Addictions lead to more crime and a breakdown of families.

Here’s just one of many examples of that fact: Indianapolis’ Penrod Society has sued former treasurer Brandon Benker to recover about $382,000 that he is accused of stealing. The theft, allegedly driven by Benker’s gambling addiction, nearly drove the Society to bankruptcy.

Offer more legal gambling and look for more Penrod-style thefts.

Yet, state leaders are reluctant to let gambling enterprises go into bankruptcy because government has its own addiction — to the tax money generated by casinos. It’s hard to tell, however, how much the industry is really hurting, or whether business will pick up once the economy recovers.

The plea for tax relief takes different forms. The racinos in Shelbyville and Anderson want to pay a lower rate to the state, or receive a rebate on some of the $250 million license fee they paid to set up casino-style gambling at the tracks.

But why not extend favorable tax treatment to other industries hurt by the recession but that also offer a better return on quality of life? Why not favor life science companies or book publishers?

Other special interests are pushing for even further expansions of gambling, including the move of a Lake County riverboat to a busy spot along an interstate. A Fort Wayne casino also remains a possibility.

Such moves would trigger a chess game: Other casino operators would want something as well, as they fight for larger slices of a pie that won’t get much bigger.

The study committee has a broad mandate. But the one area that should draw its focus is how to wean the state from its addiction to gambling revenue.

Casinos should not be considered too big to fail.

Russell B. Pulliam, journalist, book author, associate editor and columnist at The Indianapolis Star, is a syndicated columnist, whose columns focus on topics ranging from politics to social issues to family life. He may be contacted at: russell.pulliam@indystar.com