Here's a headline that caught us by surprise today: the Delaware House has rejected a plan by Gov. Jack Markell to reauthorize sports betting.
With Maryland poised to launch slots gambling and Delaware heavily reliant on its own gambling proceeds, the smart money was on Delaware expanding gambling to fight off the competition.
And that's exactly what gambling opponents in Maryland have long feared: that slots and other games are a race to the bottom, with competiting states driven to more and more ways to part residents and visitors with their money.
But as the Associated Press reported, Markel's legislation "received a favorable vote of 23-15, but fell two votes short of the required three-fifths majority."
As the AP notes, Delaware is one of only four states, along with Nevada, Montana and Oregon, grandfathered under a 1992 federal law that bans sports gambling.
"Officials say that Delaware's status as the only state east of the Mississippi River that can offer sports betting could provide an economic buffer against slot machine competition in neighboring Pennsylvania and Maryland and help the state close a projected budget shortfall," the wire story says.
At the very least, the development is a relief to Maryland policy makers still working to get their slots program off the ground.
