The Oregon Lottery and other state-sanctioned gambling has brought more than $12 billion in revenues to the state since it began in the 1980s.

Big money. It’s right behind the state income tax as one of the state’s largest sources of revenue. And there is a thirst for more.

Other states, such as Pennsylvania, allow much more freedom for people to gamble on more things — right from their phone.

Why not Oregon?

A new state committee is going to look at Oregon’s gambling regulations and its mix of offerings.

There are the usual issues. The committee should also address transparency. Oregonians deserve to know where the money is coming from and how it is spent. There is, at least, a temporary step back from the Oregon Lottery. More about that in a few paragraphs.

The issues that are sure to get the attention of the committee include: What is the right mix of gambling? How much state-sanctioned gambling is too much? Is Oregon doing enough to battle gambling addiction even as it encourages people to gamble? Should gambling machines be allowed at horse tracks? Are Oregon tribes losing out as the state expands gambling beyond their control?

This past legislative session Senate President Peter Courtney tried to get passed a bill to allow state-sanctioned sports betting on college sports. People already bet on college sports, after all. Why not capture some of the revenue for the state? The proposal was to take the revenue from gambling on college sports and put it into the state’s program that provides grants to college students. Legislators balked. It got one hearing and then nothing. Gambling opponents didn’t like it. Oregon tribes argued it would eat into their casino revenues.

We hope the committee also firmly backs transparency. For instance, the Oregon Lottery recently became less transparent about its money from sports betting. You used to be able to find on the Oregon Lottery’s website monthly reports showing how much was bet on various sports from cricket to chess to surfing to football and the state’s margin on each. Here’s a link to information for August 2021: tinyurl.com/ORsportshistorical

Now if you want to see that, the website directs people to a public records request. Why the added hassle? We asked the Oregon Lottery. A spokesman wasn’t immediately sure. Understandable. “I do know that our agency philosophy with public records is to be as transparent as possible,” Patrick Johnson emailed us. “So I will look into this further.”

He also swiftly sent us a link to the files. That’s here: tinyurl.com/ORsportsbetting.

So we got them. But there’s less detail in the new reports and that added hassle in getting them. Jess Nelson, public records specialist for the Oregon Lottery, later told us there’s less detail, in part, because the lottery is transitioning to a new vendor for sports betting, DraftKings. She said it is not the intent to require a formal public records request for the data. The Oregon Lottery just has not gotten around to putting the link on the webpage, yet, she said.

Right now, the Oregon Lottery is providing less data and more hassle. It’s not the biggest deal, but it should be a reminder to the new state committee that any changes to state gambling regulations should not come with less transparency.