HOH to launch gambling awareness campaign

AREA — The Maine Office of Substance Abuse (OSA) has chosen Oxford Hills to start a pilot program that aims to spread awareness about the risks of problem gambling and gambling addiction. 

The goal of the program is to educate people about what problem gambling is, the risks involved and to encourage responsible gaming.

To jump-start the program, OSA has provided a small loan to Healthy Oxford Hills (HOH) and the Healthy Maine Partnership office in Bangor.

As part of the initiative, HOH will hold a Problem Gambling Prevention Workshop for members of the community on June 4 at Stephens Memorial Hospital.

Christine Theriault, a behavioral health prevention manager from OSA says that the two communities were chosen because of the presence of casinos.

Hollywood Casino opened in Bangor in mid-March and the Oxford Casino is scheduled to open in early June.

"In trying to figure out what's the best way to disseminate information at the community level, it seemed to make sense that we would select the communities that had the casinos ... to start doing the pilot," Theriault says.

The OSA hopes to implement the awareness campaign statewide.

Theriault is quick to point out that although the program is being initiated in casino towns, it concerns all types of gambling, including lottery tickets and online games.

"This work that has been going on is certainly not just because the casinos exist," says Theriault. "We're trying to raise awareness about all types [of problem gambling] and also raise awareness about how people can do ... gambling in a responsible way."

The OSA has been pursuing the initiative for around a year and has partnered with groups, state offices and businesses across the state, including the Bureau of Alcoholic Beverages and Lottery Operations and Hollywood Casino.

Theriault says that the OSA currently has no data on the prevalence of problem gambling amongst Mainers, but national data indicates that the percentage of people who experience problem gambling increases when a casino moves into a community.

Kate Goldberg, of HOH, says that the OSA initiative is meant to address the issue of problem gambling of all kinds.

"It's not anti-gaming and gambling, it's just to promote what some of the issues are and to promote gaming and gambling responsibly," Goldberg says.

The goal of the June 4 workshop is to increase awareness of the risks of problem gambling among the community, Goldberg says. Theriault will be presenting at the workshop.

Goldberg has already reached out to community leaders, educators, clinicians, clergy and members of non-profit groups in the Oxford Hills community to attend the workshop. 

She also says that she looks forward to working with the Oxford Casino to build awareness about the issue in the community.

Including clinicians in the discussion is particularly important, says Goldberg, because problem gambling is sometimes related to other mental health issues, like depression.

"You can imagine, if someone loses a heap of money, there's associated depression that goes with that," Goldberg says.

The workshop will be held on June 4 from 2-4 p.m. at the Harper Conference Center at Stephens Memorial Hospital. To register or for more information, call Kate Goldberg at 739-6222.