An apparent gambling deal is off-track at the statehouse. Republican leaders announced last night they’d come up with new tax rates on state-licensed casinos that could pass the senate, but within hours it was unraveling. Democrat Governor Tom Vilsack says republican leaders in the senate need to make up their minds and settle on a plan. Vilsack says the reality is the Legislature must pass a gambling bill, and he says “they ought to get it done.” He says the top republicans have to take charge. Vilsack says republican leaders in the senate need “to drive the deal, whatever the deal is, home.” Vilsack says senate leaders need “to get in a room and do what leaders are supposed to do, and that is lead.” Senate President Jeff Lamberti, a republican from Ankeny, was indignant. Lamberti says it would have been nice to have a little leadership from the governor in trying to solve the problem. He says they realize they need to get it done. Lamberti says he agrees that lawmakers will have to make a decision shortly, but Lamberti says he is going to wait to sift through the “new ideas” that are being presented first. Senate Republican Leader Stewart Iverson of Dows insists the plan he advanced last night is still an option, but he says there’s a new idea on the table that he won’t disclose. Iverson says senators are “discussing a lot of things” as they “keep getting new ideas” from “various places” and Iverson says he and other senators “are going to continue down that path.” Senate Democrat Leader Michael Gronstal of Council Bluffs says part of the problem is that republican senators have a vendetta against the race tracks because the tracks sued the state. Gronstal says “the time is here to set aside past slights or hurts or bad feelings, and come up with something that works.” Gronstal uses the word “hair-brained” to describe the abandoned plan of yesterday which would have forced riverboats to make huge, one-time payments to the state to cover the tracks’ back taxes. Gronstal says he guesses republicans will offer “a plan a day, run it up the flag pole and see if it works.”
