Most of Illinois casinos are seeking permission to keep their doors open 24 hours a day. Currently the casinos are open 19 hours a day during the week and 22 hours a day on the weekends.
A public hearing has been scheduled for April 8th, and the Illinois state gaming board will vote on it at their April 22nd meeting.
Neighboring states whose casinos compete with Illinois casinos are open either 24 hours a day or just 24 on the weekends. The exact number of casinos that will be allowed to stay open all night is unknown but almost all the states casinos have shown a desire to be open around the clock.
The casinos requests to stay open are following a plunge in the states casinos. In January of 2008 profits were down 18 percent from where they were at the same time in 2007, and in February they were down 13 percent from those of February 2007.
Casinos are blaming a new ban on smoking, saying that the players are going to surrounding states where they can play all night long and smoke at the gamming tables.
Casinos officials are trying to get permission from the state to continue to allow smoking in certain sections of their casinos. They have also said that they may need to lay off several hundred employees if profits continue to drop.
Those who oppose gambling say that keeping the open around the clock will cause many problems. They say that gambling addicts only leave the casinos when they close and by keeping them open these gamblers will never leave till they are broke.
On April 8th all sides will be herd at the public meeting.