During a 2009 campaign to persuade voters to approve casino gambling, the Ohio Department of Taxation projected casino taxes would produce $1.9 billion a year.

But, a two year budget proposal released earlier this week by Governor John Kasich anticipates only half as much revenue. It projects the state’s four casinos will produce just less than a billion dollars.

Democratic strategist Sandy Theis spoke for casino opponents during the 2009 campaign. Her message was then, and is now, that casino supporters oversold Ohio voters.

“But, it was very clear from the beginning that they would do anything or say anything to win and promising all that revenue and all those jobs was their primary argument.” Says Theis

But, casino operators say the gambling landscape in Ohio changed after those 2009 revenue projections. Bob Tenenbaum speaks for Penn National Gaming, operator of casinos in Columbus and Toledo. He says the approval of slot machine-like devices at seven Ohio racetracks diverted some gamblers and their money away from casinos.

“Video lottery terminals at the racetracks, that would probably reduce casino tax revenue by about a half billion dollars. So, right there you’ve got probably half of the difference between the 2009 estimate and the new estimate from the state.” Says Tenenbaum.

That still leaves another half billion dollars between 2009 projections and what the governor now predicts.

The store’s critics call them illegal gambling, but the businesses also have their backers. Both sides appeared spoke before the House Judiciary Committee on Tuesday. Click the play button above for a full report from Statehouse correspondent Bill Cohen.

The suit from the anti-gambling group The Ohio Roundtable and some private individuals challenged the constitutionality of expanded gambling. In his ruling, Judge Timothy Horton ruled the Roundtable did not have standing to sue.

Horton said the plaintiff offered little more than bare assertions of harm and injury.

State lawmakers passed legislation in 2009 and 2011 to add new sections governing the Ohio Lottery Commission, which oversees the new video lottery terminals. The Roundtable argued that putting VLTs under the lottery commission’s control exceeded the legislature’s authority.

The Hollywood Casino in Toledo opens Tuesday, just two weeks after the state’s first casino opened to big crowds in downtown Cleveland.

Developers say there’s room for both even though the two casinos are just two hours apart.

The Toledo casino will go head-to-head for customers with three casinos that are just an hour’s drive to the north in Detroit.

Penn National Gaming Inc. is the developer behind the project in Toledo. It’s also building a casino in Columbus that’s expected to open in the fall.

Officials expect the Toledo casino that’s designed to look like a grand art deco movie house to draw around 2.8 million visitors a year.

Rep. Representative Lou Blessing, the man charged with negotiating a Statehouse compromise, said there was general agreement that Columbus and other cities getting a traditional casino didn’t need extra revenue generated by new “racinos,” or horse racing tracks with slot-like video terminals.

The bill was passed under an emergency clause, so if signed by the Governor it would go into law immediately.

Scioto Downs is so far the only vendor willing to pay the $50 million fee for a video lottery terminal facility, although other facilities are expected to eventually open.

The bill also places a one-year moratorium on new Internet sweepstakes parlors.

Lawmakers removed a measure to regulate charity card rooms.

A Tuesday meeting of a negotiating committee on the bill was postponed until Wednesday by Republican State Rep. Lou Blessing of Cincinnati. It is the second postponement in a week as the panel seeks to iron out differences between House and Senate versions of the bill.

The two chambers differed on how to distribute casino taxes and taxes paid on money wagered at horse tracks. They also diverged over whether to legalize games of chance at festivals and how to pay for a study on gambling addiction.

Ohio voters in 2009 approved casinos in Cleveland, Toledo, Cincinnati and Columbus. The state’s first casino opened last week in Cleveland.

The Hollywood Casino in Toledo will open in just over a week, but developers will be giving the media a preview of the $320 million casino on Monday.

The casino in Toledo is located just south of the city’s downtown and will be in direct competition with three casinos just an hour’s drive to the north in Detroit.

Hollywood Casino Toledo will feature 2,000 slot machines along with a grand buffet and a steakhouse overlooking the Maumee River.

Toledo officials project the casino will bring in about $3 million in tax revenue to the city this year.

Ohio’s first casino opened a week ago in downtown Cleveland and has drawn big crowds.

The measure passed on a 29-3 vote on Wednesday. It makes dozens of changes to laws involving Ohio’s four new casinos, video lottery terminals, horse racing and other forms of gambling.

The vote comes a day after a Senate panel stripped a provision that would have expanded charity card rooms from one Ohio county to all 88 counties. Senators also added a one-year moratorium on new Internet “sweepstakes” cafes in the state.

Other items include longer operating hours for bingo parlors and a requirement that the state complete a study on gambling addiction problems.

The Ohio House planned Wednesday to reject the Senate changes to the bill, which would send it to a negotiating committee.

The government oversight and reform committee slipped the amendment into the casino bill Tuesday and it could reach the Senate floor next week.

The bill would allow all 88 Ohio counties to have charity poker rooms. Senate President Tom Niehaus characterized the amendment as a minor expansion of gambling in the state. He says he doesn’t believe such facilities would cut into the profits four new Ohio casinos will share with the state.

Cuyahoga in northeast Ohio is currently the only county with a charity poker room. Neihaus says charities can book the facility for poker games and use the proceeds for their cause.

Rick Lertzman says he and a partner, Brad Pressman, hope to get a referendum question on the Ohio ballot in November to allow a casino in the Youngstown area in northeast Ohio. It would compete with a proposed race track offering video slots.

Ohio’s first casino will open in May in Cleveland, with another to open weeks later in Toledo. Casinos also were approved for Cincinnati and Columbus in a statewide vote in 2009.

Lertzman and Pressman have backed three failed gambling drives in Ohio, most recently in 2008 in Clinton County in southwest Ohio.

He said excitement about casino jobs would help get voter approval for a fifth casino.