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Did Florida Lawmakers pull a fast one and expand gambling with few people noticing in a 2009 law?  As Mike Vasilinda tells us, that’s the argument being made before the states highest court.

Voters in six counties have approved slot machines, but the state has steadfastly refused to issue licenses.

The battle is playing out over this horse track in rural Gadsden County, where voters approved slots by a two to one margin in early 2012.

“The Supreme Court of Florida is now in session.”

Marc Dunbar, an advocates for slots, says lawmakers intended to give local communities the right to decided if they wanted gambling by imposing a two part requirement.

“First you have to get a county commission to authorize a referendum, that’s what that language means. Second, you have to pass the referendum.”

But, the state’s lawyer, Jonathan Williams, told justices the argument just wasn’t logical.

“This would have been a very very significant expansion of slot machines under Florida law, and there is nary a mention in the legislative record of this kind of change” says Williams.

If the court sides with the slot machine advocates, it will likely mean the Seminole Tribe will end up paying less to the state.

And attorney Dunbar says that’s exactly the kind of revenue and policy decisions lawmakers wanted to make;

“If you look at what the compact said, the legislature reserved to itself an entire year to evaluate the consequence of gaming expansion from when the first coin drops, so they can come back and make the policy call to take it away or affirm it” Dunbar said afterward.

A friend of the court brief says only voters statewide gambling with s state wide referendum, just as they did when the lottery was allowed in 1986.

Right now Florida receives about 130 million a year from Seminole tribe Slot machines. Advocates say the state would get much more from the six counties where voters have approved slot machine referendums.