It isn’t easy to promote moderation and financial discipline from the bowels of a casino.
But that’s what Massachusetts state workers try to do every day, amid the clanging bells and flashing lights of the slot machines.
At the MGM Springfield in western Massachusetts, workers wearing green polos stand outside their small office, right off the casino floor.
Above them, a sign reads “GameSense,” the state’s signature program to curb problem gambling. A mounted screen cycles through messages such as “Keep sports betting fun. Set a budget and stick to it.”
The workers hand out free luggage tags and travel-size tissues to encourage people to stop and chat. If they succeed, they give customers brochures displaying the state’s gambling helpline number and website. They can even enroll them in a program called “PlayMyWay,” which allows customers to set monthly spending limits on how much they gamble.
Outside the casinos, GameSense is marketed on social media and on sports betting apps and websites. Meanwhile, the state’s Department of Public Health puts its own moderation messages on buses and billboards.
“That’s a big movement in 12 years,” said Mark Vander Linden, who oversees the GameSense program in Massachusetts.
An ad for GameSense, a “responsible gaming” program for Massachusetts residents, appears on a screen at the MGM Springfield casino.(Karen Brown/New England Public Media)
Massachusetts’ first casino opened in 2015, and as the gaming industry grew, the state developed what it calls a “responsible gaming” program, funded by a surtax on gambling industry profits.
At first, state regulators tried various strategies to educate customers about the addictive nature of gambling, as well as the financial risks.
“It was much more about making sure that ther …