The Colorado Lottery is planning to introduce online ticket sales by 2027 as a way to increase revenue for outdoors projects, but critics warn it could be a slippery slope toward legalized internet gambling — similar to playing online slot machines. A bipartisan group of Colorado legislators on Fr iday filed a bill to block online lottery ticket sales even as the Colorado Lottery Commission formulates its plan with the support of Gov. Jared Polis. The online ticket sales are necessary to increase revenue for the lottery’s mission to fund outdoor recreation and wildlife, Colorado Lottery director Tom Seaver said. ​​”Governor Polis continues looking for opportunities to expand the lottery, which allows Coloradans to support great organizations like Great Outdoors Colorado, which funds parks, trails, recreation, open space, wildlife projects and increases access to the outdoors,” Polis spokesman Eric Maruyama said in a statement. “The governor is supportive of increasing consumer convenience and internet freedom.” The lottery also plans to reverse a longstanding policy that prohibits people from buying tickets with credit cards at retail outlets, such as convenience stores, as it rolls out the online ticket sales, Seaver said. The bill, SB26-117, would prohibit that change because Coloradans do not need to go into credit card debt while playing lottery games, said Sen. Jeff Bridges, D-Greenwood Village, who is one of the bill’s sponsors. The legislators also believe their bill is necessary to prevent people from becoming addicted to gambling, a problem that has grown since Colorado legalized sports betting in 2020. Lottery tickets sold online in other states resemble web-based slot machines, Bridges said. Online gambling involving traditional casino games such as slot machines, blackjack and roulette is often referred to as iGaming. “If you look at what these online scratch ticket companies do, it is iGaming,” Bridges said. “The state not only should not be participating in that, but they shouldn’t be pushing it with more than $10 million in advertising. This is iGaming sponsored by the state to the benefit of the state at a time when Coloradans can’t afford to live here.” However, the lottery needs to increase revenue to support Great Outdoors Colorado and other programs that protect and promote outdoor recreation, Seaver said. He also said that lottery players are asking for more convenient ways to play the games. “We can’t sit still and meet our numbers,” Seaver said. “We have to keep growing in order to meet the needs of our recipients.” Great Outdoors Colorado, a trust fund created in 1992, receives 50% of the lottery’s profits to fund outdoor preservation projects. The Conservation Trust Fund receives another 40% of lottery sales, and Colorado Parks and Wildlife gets a 10% cut. But the funding structure for Great Outdoors Colorado is the primary reason the lottery wants to boost sales, Seaver said. The amount of money Great Outdoors Colorado receives is capped each year, based on a formula involving the Consumer Price Index, and the surplus money is doled out to various organizations, including the Building Excellent Schools Today for school construction and the Outdoor Equity Grant Program, for youth programs. In 2025, however, the cap was not met, and those other groups did not receive lottery funding. Do you have a gambling problem? The Problem Gambling Coalition of Colorado helps people who are addicted to gambling. Call 303-955-4682 or visit cogamblerhelp.org for help. The Denver Post reports on the impacts of gambling in Colorado and wants to hear your stories about betting on sports. Please contact reporter Noelle Phillips at [email protected] if you are willing to talk about your experience. The Colorado Lottery needs to increase revenue, and Seaver sees online sales as a way to get there. “We have to keep growing in order to meet the needs of recipients,” he said. The lottery wants to open its online ticket sales by selling the products already offered, including Lotto, Powerball and Mega Millions tickets, as well as various scratch-off games, Seaver said. The plans are still in the developmental phase, so it is unclear exactly how those products would be sold online and delivered to customers. It is also too early to determine whether the lottery would offer digital scratch-ticket sales and what those games would look like. “We are a long way from saying what kind of game we would bring,” Seaver said. “From my perspective, you start slow with what kind of games you are going to bring and then progress.” Back-door path to legalized iGaming? However, critics are warning that Colorado’s creation of online lottery ticket sales could create a back-door entry to online, casino-style gambling, and that addictive behavior will increase because people can play on their cellphones while charging their credit cards. Those critics point toward the Michigan Lottery and its online games, such as Lucky Coins Disco Pig and Pantheon of Olympus Lightning. In those games, players enter a credit card and can play as many times as they want, punching buttons to line up icons such as Greek coins or disco balls to win money. The games feature cartoon drawings and music. The National Association Against iGaming supports the Colorado bill because the group opposes online casino games, said Oliver Barie, the organization’s government relations director. The association, which is backed by traditional casinos, including Monarch Casino in Black Hawk, and the state’s casino towns, fears an online lottery will lead to state-sponsored digital casino games. “We’ve seen other states, where oftentimes the first step is you have online lottery sales,” Barie said. “Depending on the iLottery platform, you could have a traditional ticket on your phone or games that look and feel a lot like a slot machine. That’s where our concerns are.” Barie cited a recent poll conducted by the association that showed a majority of respondents in Colorado opposed a lottery expansion, purchases charged to credit cards and 18-year-olds playing lottery games online. Internet casino games often involve bright colors, music and cartoon characters that create a “stimulus reward loop” that increases the risk of addiction, said Jamie Glick, president of the Problem Gambling Coalition of Colorado. “Essentially, what that means is the quicker you can interact with a game and get a response back, the higher the likelihood of addiction,” Glick said. “Those games, just from an addiction standpoint, brain chemistry standpoint, they play like iGaming.” Glick also said he is concerned that online lottery games could appeal to children because they resemble video games. Online games often ask players to scan driver’s licenses to verify their ages, but Glick said young people find ways to circumvent those rules. “We certainly don’t think there should be any gambling that could attract younger users,” he said. Finally, allowing credit card sales increases the risk of addiction because it makes it easier for people to keep playing, Glick said. “One thing I’m not neutral on is gambling on credit, just because that’s one of the biggest risk factors in developing a gambling problem and also disrupting your life through gambling, when you’re gambling with money that you don’t have,” he said. Seaver said that the lottery would create guardrails and limits for people playing online. “We’re not the first to the dance on this, and that’s fine,” Seaver said. “We wanted to see how other states managed the product and responsible gambling over the past few years.” The lottery will not introduce credit card sales until a comprehensive player health program is established, said Meghan Dougherty, a Colorado Lottery spokeswoman. “At the same time, when this option is available, it will allow players to use the payment method of their choice,” she said. Lottery tickets already available online Colorado residents already can buy state lottery tickets online through third-party vendors, known in the industry as couriers. Four companies offer online ticket sales in Colorado. Their operations are similar to how DoorDash and Instacart allow people to order food and groceries over their phones or computers, except people do not receive a physical ticket at their doorsteps. The Colorado Lottery does not license or regulate couriers, Dougherty said. The couriers have agreements with brick-and-mortar stores, and those stores are subject to rules that allow them to partner with couriers. On Lotto.com, one of the companies doing business in Colorado, players pay a convenience fee on their purchases. For example, Colorado residents on Friday could buy a $5 Orange Cash scratch ticket for $6.50 or a $2 Powerball ticket for $2.50. Lotto.com owns a convenience store on Wadsworth Boulevard called Players Cafe, said Tom Metzger, the website’s chief executive officer. There, people can buy lottery tickets or traditional convenience store items. The online sales are routed to that store, where employees scan tickets sold at the store and then send pictures to players to confirm their purchases and log their serial numbers. If someone buys a scratch ticket, Lotto.com puts a “digital cover” over the numbers so the player can simulate scratching off the latex of a paper ticket with their fingers. Prize money is deposited into an online wallet, and anyone who wins $600 or more still has to pick up the paper ticket to cash their winnings. Related Articles Colorado voters would be leery of legalized internet gambling, poll shows BetMGM becomes latest sports betting company fined by Colorado Colorado has banned 7 people for life from the state’s casinos. Here’s what it takes to make the list. Colorado promotes awareness about gambling addiction as bettors prepare for March Madness NBA starts review of policies after gambling-related arrests of Chauncey Billups, Terry Rozier Lotto.com targets people who do not ordinarily play the lottery at convenience stores, Metzger said. The company advertises online and tries to lure people who Metzger describes as “incremental players.” The average transaction is $10, he said. The couriers do not sell products that are not already offered by the Colorado Lottery. After the bill was filed Friday, courier companies began scrambling to figure out how it might impact their business models. Bridges said he did not intend to put them out of business and believes they are protected. But others weren’t so clear on the bill’s language. Metzger said his business would not suffer if the Colorado Lottery eventually offers online ticket sales. He cited New Hampshire, West Virginia and Washington, D.C., as places where couriers and state-sanctioned online lottery sales co-exist. “We live in an age of convenience and, quite frankly, if you don’t want your players to age out and you to continue returning those funds to good causes, you have to reach players where they are,” Metzger said. “People just don’t have the same behavioral patterns that they used to. So we need to modernize the lottery like everything else is modern.” Get more Colorado news by signing up for our daily Your Morning Dozen email newsletter. ...read more read less