The issue of breaking Hawaii’s prohibition on all forms of legal gambling is once again before the state Legislature — and one bill would cautiously renew the debate over whether the state Department of Hawaiian Home Lands should be allowed to build a casino resort to generate badly needed revenue to help clear the backlog of Native Hawaiians waiting for homes.

Various bills in the state Senate and House also would create a state lottery, allow online fantasy sports and even lead to a single, Las Vegas-style casino, perhaps on top of the Hawai‘i Convention Center.

Hawaii and Utah remain the only two states to prohibit any legal gambling, despite repeated efforts in the Hawaii Legislature.

House Bill 2040 and Senate Bill 2365 would allow for a state lottery; SB 2310 would designate “excess” lottery proceeds go toward a pest inspection, quarantine and eradication fund aimed at invasive species; and HB 2004 would allow for “Online Fantasy Sports Contests.”

Even the sponsors of some of Hawaii’s gambling bills acknowledge that legislators are unlikely to lift the gambling taboo this year with elections coming up and especially with the economy improving and a bold proposal by House leadership to use $600 million of state funds for a one-time infusion to DHHL to help clear the backlog of 28,000 Native Hawaiians who are entitled to home lands.

The idea to allow DHHL to generate millions of dollars in revenue through gambling divided the Native Hawaiian community when the idea was originally proposed just before Christmas 2020, on the eve of the 2021 legislative session.

The Hawaiian Homes Commission also was divided and voted 5-4 to forward the idea to the Legislature.

SB 1321 and HB 359 originally were written to allow DHHL to build a casino resort on Hawaiian home lands to exclude lands west of Ko Olina.

HB 359 failed to get out of the House Economic Development Committee in February. SB 1321 later morphed into a bill that would give the Home Lands Commission five years to figure out whether it wanted to permit any form of gambling, whether it be a casino, lottery, bingo or even horse racing.

At a February hearing of the Senate Hawaiian Affairs Committee, it took less than two minutes to defer SB 1321, killing all hopes of any form of legal gambling becoming reality out of the 2021 legislative session.

SB 1321 and HB 359 are still technically alive.

The 2022 versions revert to DHHL’s original concept that gross gaming revenues would be taxed at a rate of 80%: 75% for the Hawaiian home operating fund, 5% to the Native Hawaiian rehabilitation fund, 15% into the state general fund and 5% to a proposed state gaming fund.

But even one of the senators who introduced SB 1321 this year — Sen. Jarrett Keohokalole (D, Kailua-Kaneohe) — said the passage of any bill to legalize any kind of gambling seems unlikely this year.

SB 1321 is “still technically a bill,” Keohokalole said. “But even as one of the introducers, I wouldn’t anticipate it going much further — but I could always be wrong. Gambling has been discussed in the Legislature a handful of times in my lifetime, but it’s never gone anywhere.”

But Keohokalole was surprised that the idea of gambling revenue to help fund Native Hawaiian homes attracted so much support in 2021 at the Hawaiian Homes Commission and in the Legislature.

Instead, Keohokalole likes the idea of the intent of SB 2608 — which he also helped introduce — and HB 1962. Both would require DHHL to conduct a study of the ramifications of a casino, including projected revenues and potential negative effects, such as gambling addiction and crime.

DHHL’s report would be due before the start of the 2023 legislative session.

Keohokalole, like many others, felt that the original DHHL proposal had been rushed.

At the same time, he said many critics against legalizing gambling cited studies “that were dated and we were working around assumptions that people held their whole lives.”

So he would like a clear-eyed study of the pros and cons surrounding casinos, particularly ones on Native American tribal land “about what you should do and what you should not do.”

At the least, the Hawaiian Home Lands casino proposal again highlighted the need for affordable housing — especially for Native Hawaiians, he said.

“We have this constitutional obligation to Hawaiian Homes beneficiaries, of which I am not one,” Keoho­kalole said. “And we have this broader problem with the lack of affordable housing. It’s encouraging that the big thing we’re talking about is housing.”

State Rep. John Mizuno (D, Kamehameha Heights-­Kalihi Valley) has again introduced a bill that would allow for just one casino in Waikiki, perhaps on top of the Hawai‘i Convention Center.

HB 1820 would prohibit the casino from being inside a hotel, but gamblers would be required to stay at least one day and one night in an Oahu hotel for every day of play, which would cost $20.

HB 1820 also would create a gaming control commission, a state gaming fund and a compulsive-gambler program.

Instead of island residents regularly traveling to Las Vegas, Mizuno said, much of that money could stay home and generate both jobs and taxes.

“If gambling was so sinister, why do a ton of people regularly go to Las Vegas, our ‘ninth island,’ and spend $1 billion a year?” Mizuno asked.

In 2018 Mizuno and his wife, May, led the Honolulu Star-Advertiser on a tour of a dingy and dirty illegal game room in his district on Kalihi Street, across the street from Kalihi Uka Elementary School.

The entrance to the downstairs gaming room was a makeshift wooden frame covered with concertina wire and surveillance cameras.

Instead, Mizuno said the intent of HB 1820 would allow for one Las Vegas-style casino with wagers closer to downtown Las Vegas casinos than the more expensive Vegas Strip.

Like Las Vegas casinos, Mizuno imagines the Waikiki version would include free alcohol, slot machines and other popular games.

“You want to make it fun and attractive,” he said. “That’s why so many people go to Vegas and especially to the California Hotel and Fremont and the Golden Nugget downtown, instead of the Strip.”

Asked whether 2022 will be the year that the Legislature allows some form of legalized gambling, Mizuno said, “I’ll be brutally honest. The answer is no.”

“Especially with this year being an election year, the people of Hawaii just aren’t ready for it,” he said.

But like medical cannabis, same-sex marriage and death-with-dignity laws that took years to become reality, Mizuno said the current debate over whether to allow some form of legalized gambling in Hawaii “is good. Discussion is good.”