Kentucky Lottery turns 30-years-old

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WTVQ)- The Kentucky Lottery turned thirty-years-old April 4,2019, bringing $20-billion in revenue, and $12-billion in prizes.

Governor Wallace Wilkinson, in 1989, bought the first two Kentucky Lottery ticket for $3 in Louisville. He bought them from a Thornton’s Gas Station on Preston Highway.

Neither of the two tickets Wilkinson bought that morning turned out to be winners. However, after $20 billion in sales during the past 30 years, Kentucky Lottery players have received over $12 billion in prizes.

The CEO of the Kentucky Lottery, Tom Delacenserie, stated that thanks to the incredible network of retailers and the confidence the people of Kentucky have shown in the games, they’ve been able to achieve significant growth and support a variety of programs in the Commonwealth over the past three decades.

Delacenserie also discussed how he knows Kentucky’s most deserving students are counting on them, and that their mission of ‘fueling imagination and funding education’ is more important than ever.

Close to 3000 Kentucky Lottery retailers have shared in the $1.25 billion in profits. Lottery products not only provide a source of income through commissions and bonuses, they also help drive people into stores to buy tickets.

Tod Griffin of the Kentucky Grocers & Convenience Store Association, explained that retailers are proud to be a vital partner in the success of the Kentucky Lottery over the past 30 years, and Lottery tickets are a continued to be a valued sales opportunity for thousands of retailers across Kentucky.

For nearly two decades, Lottery proceeds have been dedicated to college scholarship and grant programs. They’re administered by the Kentucky Higher Education Assistance Authority.

Gene Hutchins, the executive director of the KHEAA, says the opportunity to provide Kentucky families with the necessary education and training to compete in today’s global economy is the best investment the Commonwealth can make for the future. Hutchins continues to say that the Kentucky Lottery continues to be a critical partner in providing the needed resources to fulfill that commitment.

The money that is raised from the lottery is used to help fund some of the biggest programs that Kentucky has, including College scholarships and Grant programs.

Scholarships and Grants gain the largest chunk of proceeds. around $3.4 billion, have gone to fund programs to help Kentucky students stay home to attend college.

To put this in perspective, from every dollar of non-loan college student financial aid awarded in Kentucky, 95 cents of it comes straight from Kentucky Lottery proceeds

These proceeds have funded every dime of the popular KEES scholarships. The proceeds are also dedicated to the need-based College Access Program and Kentucky Tuition Grants.

In addition, through executive order of Governor Bevin, they also fund the Work Ready Scholarship Program. This enables any Kentuckian to return to school to get a degree or certificate in a high-demand field. Also funded is the Dual Credit Program, where high school students complete college classes for credit before they graduate. In many cases, students have already completed more than half their first semester of college before they ever step foot on campus.

The Lottery revenue also helps to fund the General fund, and Seek School Funding. The General Assembly sent lottery proceeds to the General Fund. This is the funding used to run our state, and the largest single expenditure from the General Fund is for primary and secondary education (K-12). A total of approximately $1.5 Billion went to the General Fund over the years.

For two years (1993-1994) $214 million of the General Fund money went to the SEEK program. This stands for Supporting Excellence in Education in Kentucky, and is a school funding program established by KERA to provide money to support elementary and secondary education in the state.

The state Lottery goes further in education to support Literacy Development in the state. From 2000 to 2018, the Collaborative Center for Literacy Development at UK received the first $3 million each year in lottery proceeds. A total of $54 million went to this program during that time frame. The program works to promote reading skills among both children and adults across the Commonwealth.

The Lottrey helps to also support the Affordable Housing Trust Fund, and Veterans Bonuses. From 1999 to 2003, unclaimed lottery prizes were directed to the Affordable Housing Trust Fund program. The Affordable Housing Trust received $21 million in unclaimed prizes, used to help build nearly 2770 housing units for low-income Kentuckians in all 120 counties.

For the Lottery’s first three years, the General Assembly used proceeds to fund $32 million in recognition bonuses to Kentucky veterans of the Vietnam War.

According to Lottery research, about 60% of Kentuckians don’t feel like they get enough information on where the proceeds are spent. One of the main culprits for this is the fact that for 25 years it was literally against the law for the Lottery to publicize these programs.

When the Lottery was established in 1989, there was a beneficiary advertising restriction in the state law which laid out how the Kentucky Lottery was to be operated. It said that no programs which benefited from Kentucky Lottery proceeds could be mentioned in any advertisement. Kentucky was the only state in America that had or ever has had such a restriction. Finally, in the 2014 the restriction was overturned. Shortly after that was when the “Fueling Imagination, Funding Education” tagline was launched.