A month before March Madness, the Kentucky Horse Racing and Gaming Corporation has downsized its sports-betting enforcement team, as the 7-month-old enterprise reshapes how Kentucky regulates the gambling industry.
The shakeup comes two years after critics complained Kentucky wasn’t adequately staffed to regulate sports betting and five months before the corporation is scheduled to add charitable gaming to the portfolio of gambling segments it oversees.
The WCPO 9 I-Team learned about the downsizing from three people hired to oversee the 2023 launch of sports betting, which generated $2.6 billion in betting activity last year from eight online sports books and 13 retail locations.
The former state employees said all 10 people who worked for the agency when the first sports bets were placed on September 7, 2023, have since lost their jobs.
