Alabama House Minority Leader Anthony Daniels put his cards on the table Tuesday.
“I’ll start with the most difficult conversation as it relates to right now,” he said. “That’s gaming.”
Daniels was addressing a crowded room at the Business Council of Alabama’s Tuesday Morning Issues Briefing.
“Now it’s not difficult to everyone, but we’ve seen that the Senate has made some changes I understand,” he said. “I read some comments from my counterpart in the Senate that made mention to where the House bill-they kind of changed the House bill.
“So, hopefully the bill comes down (Tuesday) from the Senate or comes down later in the week and we’ll be able to get to a point where we will be able to work things out.”
Daniels said a non-concurrence on the legislation is likely due to the alterations made by the Senate.
“I’m 60% sure there will be a non-concurrence with the current legislation, the changes that have been made to the legislation,” he said.
Daniels, did however, remain optimistic that a solution to the differences is on the horizon.
“We are hopeful that those individuals that are in the conference committee will get to a point to where they are able to reach some type of agreement so that we’re able to finally and once and for all move on and allow Alabamians the option of voting on a lottery as well as passing gaming or using the current infrastructure,” Daniels said. “Whatever they decide to generate revenue.”
The Huntsville Democrat then emphasized the role legalized gaming could potentially play in funding early childhood education within the state.
“For me, the outcome of all of this is the income that’s generated so that we can do more things-become more innovative in areas that we are certainly lacking as a state,” Daniels said. “One area that I think we should certainly look at is going to be early childhood.”
He said funding from gaming could bring underserved school systems a level of success not previously experienced.
“We want to make sure that communities across the state of Alabama who haven’t enjoyed or had the opportunity to have a lot of success in their school system get to,” said Daniels. “Our young people are lacking the infrastructure needed at birth to PreK that really drives opportunity and give us the opportunity to increase the rigor long term from an academic stand point.”
The House Minority leader went into detail about what the changes could look like once funding from gaming is secured.
“We hope to at some point have a mobile universal early childhood education program, specifically Pre-K, but also using mixed delivery systems whether its churches, nonprofits, or other organizations that are into the early childhood area or even brining some of the home daycares out of the shadows so that they can also get to where they need to be,” Daniels said. “For us, the ultimate goal is to provide the highest level of education on the front end because we know that 95% of brain development is from birth to the age of 5.
“We are investing in our young people.”
Daniels also said for every dollar invested in early childhood education, the state saves $7 in Corrections.
Austen Shipley is a staff writer for Yellowhammer News.
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