TEXAS HOLDEM ONLINE POKER

Beneath the banner of a struggling charity and within the parameters of a gaming law with a $2 bet limit, high stakes tournament poker has arrived in New Hampshire.

A top prize of $5,000 could draw up to 225 poker devotees who will lay down at least $100 each to play in a “No-Limit Texas Hold’Em” tournament tomorrow night in Manchester.

For six hours, beginning at 6 p.m., they will play a game of elimination, betting poker chips that — because of New Hampshire’s quirky gaming law — have no monetary value. They will play a card game that’s become a national craze, tantalizing viewers fascinated by televised coverage, from Las Vegas and Atlantic City casinos, where poker tournament jackpots top seven figures.

Organizers expect a good crowd to gather at the Manchester Bingo Center on John E. Devine Drive. They have encouraged preregistration and hope to fill all 225 chairs, arranged nine to a table, where players will vie with poker’s mix of luck and skill to amass the greatest number of chips.

Two Texas Hold’Em tourneys have been held since January under the sponsorship of On the Road to Recovery, a Manchester charity that helps the mentally disabled. On the Road has a license — approved by the chief of police and the state’s Charitable Trusts director — that allows it to conduct up to 10 poker tournament nights this year.

The first game attracted 161 players and paid out $14,400 in prize money; the second, 225 players and $13,250.

The second game had more participants, but less prize money because gross revenue fluctuates from night to night, organizers explained.

The game is drawing a mix of men and women; some young, others more mature. A player can husband his initial 1,000 chips or go through them in a 20-minute round of play. The house rules include an option to buy additional chips as the tournament progresses.

The house and its dealers also rake a portion of each pot from the regular poker played in “side games,” which are separate from the tournament play. Chips do have monetary value in the regular poker games. They can be redeemed for cash and players are required to adhere to the maximum $2 per wager stipulated in the “games of chance.”
Close to the vest

The number of tournament participants — with each paying at least $100 to play — and the amount of prize money distributed thus far suggests the nightly take has been in the $25,000 range, but lobbyist Richard L. Bouley refused to provide specific information about the total revenue generated by the first two nights.

The charity is not required to file a report, detailing to the state its total revenue, prizes, expenses — everything from hall rental, to advertising, to the decks of cards and the chips — and profit, until it completes the 10 tournament days authorized by its license.

“Please understand this is a business and there are competitors out there,” Bouley said.

As far as poker tournaments in New Hampshire, On the Road is “the only charity at this time that is offering a $5,000 prize to the top player,” Bouley said.

“We don’t want to be too explicit because we want to be sure the charity continues to make money,” he said.
The consultants’ role

Bouley represents On the Road to Recovery as well as James Timbas and James Cristos, who manage the bingo hall and are the charitable organization’s “gaming consultants.”

Under its contract with the charity, the Timbas-Cristos company, S & T Consultants Inc., gets “50 percent of all net proceeds,” after prizes and expenses are paid.

What’s left for the charity?

“We can say that, based on the money collected at these first two events, the charity has definitely made between $3,000 and $5,000 on each event,” Bouley said.

As charity gaming goes, that’s not a bad profit.

Said Bouley: “Poker is proving to be a pretty good windfall for this charity.”
Poker vs. bingo

Compare poker, for example, to what On the Road gets from the weekly bingo games it sponsors Thursdays at the hall on Devine Drive.

For the 10 months beginning in May 2003, Sweepstakes Commission records show the organization’s bingo and Lucky 7 pull-tab ticket sales took in $426,118 and paid out $357,690 in prizes. After expenses, On the Road’s net was $10,718 — a profit of only about $270 a night.

Executive Director Andrea Tinkham said On the Road turned to bingo last year and, now, to the “no-limit” poker, because the funding is receives from public sources is inadequate to meet the needs of almost 900 people who depend on the organization’s support services.

The charity gets no money from the city, and the state’s current allocation, $177,000, was less than the charity got last year. That falls far short of the $360,000 a year Tinkham feels she would need “to run the best program that I can run.”
Long days

Tinkham has had some success writing proposals for government and foundation grants, but those funds are usually earmarked for specific projects, not operating expenses, and the process is complex and time consuming.

“It became very apparent that, if I didn’t want to be frustrated and worried all the time, I really needed to find some alternative sources of funding,” she said of the Thursday nights she and her assistant director, Kimberly Mueller, spend in the bingo hall. Their poker tournament days are 12 hours long: from 1 p.m. when regular poker play begins, to 1 a.m., when the tournament wraps up.

Tinkham said state officials who deal with her funding requests look upon her poker tournament effort as “a favorable idea because it allows us to raise money that they won’t have to give us.”

The poker tournament approach to fundraising is enticing because it offers players a potential to win big within the framework of the law that limits charity gambling to $2 a bet. At its March 29 game, On the Road to Recovery distributed $13,250 in prizes — $5,000 to the player who accumulated the most chips; $2,500 to the runner-up; $1,000 for third place; $500 each for the next six players; and $250 each for the 10th through 16th place finishers.
Dealing with limits

“I’ve gotten a lot of inquiries about it (from charitable organizations), but not a whole lot of applications just yet,” said Audrey Blodgett, a paralegal at the Charitable Trusts office.

“I tell them as long as they follow (the games of chance law), which has a $2 wager requirement, there is nothing to say it’s illegal,” Blodgett said.

They get around the $2 wager limit by declaring the poker chips’ only value is in the total number of them that are stacked in front of a player.

“If the chips are of no value, you can (legally) wager 100 or more chips at a time,” Blodgett said.

Lobbyist Bouley acknowledged the poker tournament is “a little unique.” But then he added, “It’s just an extension of the games of chance” law that allows charities to raise funds with “Monte Carlo” style casino nights.
Newfound popularity

“This no-limit Texas Hold’Em is a phenomenon that is sweeping the country,” said lawyer John P. Kacavas, who has guided On the Road through the licensing process.

“I’ve watched it on television. Whoever thought watching a card game would be entertaining, but it is, and a lot of people are interested in it, even people who don’t play cards. We think people are willing to make a contribution to a charity to play the game and we want to take advantage of that.”

Whether it’s bingo, casino nights or poker tournaments, charities will gravitate “to games that people are attracted to in order to raise money. . . . If it fits into the statutory definition of a game of chance, the charity is going to go to it,” Kacavas said.
Expanding gambling

Could this be an opening for high-stakes gambling?

Ted Gatsas, a state senator and Manchester alderman, citing the popularity of televised poker, suggested recently that legalizing high-stakes poker play might be a way to funnel gambling revenue to four racetracks whose repeated attempts to acquire video poker machines have been rebuffed by lawmakers.

Gatsas suggested live poker at the tracks could generate a tax return to the state. Under current law, the state does not collect any revenue from poker tournaments or casino nights sponsored by charities.

“The way we’re doing it,” Kacavas said, “it’s intended to make money for the charity. That is what is permissible under the statutory scheme. . . .

“Is it going to open the door to gambling at the racetracks? I don’t know that. That is a legislative issue,” the lawyer said.