Report 2018-132 Recommendations

To ensure that it has comprehensive licensing information to determine its ongoing workload and staffing needs, the commission should implement procedures for tracking the number of license applications it receives from the bureau each fiscal year and the outcomes of those applications, such as approvals and denials.

To prevent unnecessary delays and use of resources and to ensure its compliance with state law, the commission should, following the Legislature's amendment of the Gambling Act that we recommend, revise its regulations and policies for conducting evidentiary hearings. These revisions should specify that the commission may vote at regular meetings on a final basis to approve or deny licenses, registrations, permits, findings of suitability, or other matters and that it is not required to conduct evidentiary hearings unless applicants request that it do so.

To better align the revenue in the Gambling Fund with the costs of the activities that the fund supports, the bureau and the commission should conduct cost analyses of those activities by July 2020. At a minimum, these cost analyses should include the following:

The entities' personnel costs, operating costs, and any program overhead costs.

Updated time estimates for their core and support activities, such as background investigations.

The cost of their enforcement activities.

Using this information, the bureau and commission should reset their regulatory fees to reflect their actual costs. Before conducting its fee study, the bureau should implement our recommendations to improve its processes for assigning applications, ensuring the completeness of applications, and developing time-reporting protocols.

To increase uniformity in the licensing process, the commission should revise its current regulations and submit them to the Office of Administrative Law for public review by May 2020 to address the following areas of inconsistency:

Application processes and time frames.

The ability to work during the application process.

The ability to reapply after denial.

In revising its regulations, the commission should increase consistency across application types while minimizing risk to the public.

To ensure that it does not hold hearings that may cause applicants unnecessary harm, the commission should, following the Legislature's amendment to state law that we previously recommend, establish and implement formal protocols for informing applicants how to withdraw their requests for hearings and for guiding commission staff when discontinuing the hearing process at the request of applicants.

To avoid unnecessary delays in its licensing process, the bureau should, by November 2019, begin reviewing applications for completeness upon receiving them. If it determines that an application is incomplete, it should notify the applicant immediately.

To help it identify which portions of the background investigation process most contribute to lengthy delays, the bureau should conduct an analysis of its investigation processes by November 2019 and should implement procedural changes to improve its timeliness in processing applications.

To ensure that it approaches its remaining backlog strategically and that it establishes accountability for its use of resources, the bureau should develop and initiate a formal plan by November 2019 for completing the remaining backlogged applications. The plan should identify the license types the bureau will target and the order in which it will target them, along with its rationale for the planned approach. The plan should also include clear goals that identify the numbers of applications it will complete and its time frames for doing so.

To ensure that its licensing process is transparent and consistent, the bureau should implement formal procedures for prioritizing its completion of legal reviews of ownership applications. The procedures should specify any circumstances that justify reviewing applications out of the order in which the bureau received them.

To minimize the degree to which its process to change its regulations may result in the disparate treatment of card room owners, the bureau should temporarily approve or deny its backlogged games applications by July 2019.

To ensure that it fairly charges applicants for the cost of its licensing activities, the bureau should establish and implement policies by July 2019 requiring staff to properly and equitably report and bill time and restricting which activities staff may charge to nonbillable and noncase hours. It should also establish clear thresholds for the proportions of time staff may charge to the various categories and require the bureau's management to review compliance with the pertinent restrictions.

To better align the revenue in the Gambling Fund with the costs of the activities that the fund supports, the bureau and the commission should conduct cost analyses of those activities by July 2020. At a minimum, these cost analyses should include the following:

-The entities' personnel costs, operating costs, and any program overhead costs.

-Updated time estimates for their core and support activities, such as background investigations.

-The cost of their enforcement activities.

Using this information, the bureau and commission should reset their regulatory fees to reflect their actual costs. Before conducting its fee study, the bureau should implement our recommendations to improve its processes for assigning applications, ensuring the completeness of applications, and developing time-reporting protocols.

To ensure that its level of review is commensurate to license type, the bureau should review and revise each of its background investigation procedures as needed by November 2019.

To ensure that it treats applicants consistently, the bureau should begin conducting periodic reviews by November 2019 to determine whether staff are following procedures when conducting background investigations for applicants for all license types.

To ensure that it has the ability to justify the results of its background investigations, the bureau should develop a formal record retention policy for application documentation by November 2019. This policy should include rationales for retaining types of documents and should establish a process for ensuring staff compliance.

To ensure that it compensates the Special Distribution Fund for the card room-related enforcement activities for which that fund has paid, the bureau should reconcile the hours due to the Special Distribution Fund for at least the last three fiscal years by November 2019. Moving forward, the bureau should ensure that it provides prompt reimbursement when employees in positions that are funded by one source perform activities that should have been funded by another source.

To ensure that its employees allocate their activities to the correct funding sources, the bureau should by July 2019 formalize policies and procedures that provide clear guidelines to employees when reporting time spent on activities that relate to funding sources other than the funding sources for their positions.

To ensure that it can provide useful and accurate data on the locations where enforcement employees spend their time, the bureau should equip its time-reporting system by November 2019 with the capacity to track all hours employees spend at each card room and casino

Given that the bureau has not achieved the expected benefits from adding 32 additional positions, the Legislature should not approve any requests to make funding for these positions permanent. Instead, the Legislature should extend funding for an additional two years, during which time the bureau should be able to clear its existing number of pending applications. At that point, the Legislature should reevaluate the bureau's long-term staffing needs, taking into consideration the extent to which it has implemented the recommendations in this report.

To prevent delays and the unnecessary use of resources from requiring the commission to hold evidentiary hearings in all cases in order to deny applicants, the Legislature should amend the Gambling Act to allow the commission to take action at its regular licensing meetings rather than require it to hold evidentiary hearings.

To ensure that all fees that generate revenue for the Gambling Fund have clear, stated purposes limiting their use, the Legislature should require that when updating fee amounts, the commission and the bureau must also update their regulations to include clear statements about the need for and appropriate use of each fee type.