Yellowknife dance group organizer questions city's high Chase the Ace lottery fees

As a Yellowknife dance troupe waits for the city to update a bylaw regulating lottery fees, an organizer of that group is wondering why the city's administration won't use a clause, written into the current law, that could improve those fees now.

The city's lottery licence bylaw lays out a fee structure eligible organizations pay to hold lotteries, which is based on their jackpots.

It's a straightforward way to run one-time events such as bingo or raffles, but Chase the Ace is a different sort of lottery.

It's an ongoing event featuring a weekly raffle winner who instantly gets a small prize as well as the chance to win a jackpot — which accumulates weekly — by picking the ace of spades out of a 52-card deck.

That means Chase the Ace could last as long as 52 weeks, which translates into as many as 52 municipal fees. The City of Yellowknife calculates each week's fee according to the maximum estimated prize, not what is actually paid out each week. So once the jackpot reaches $20,000, that weekly fee climbs to $1,500. If the jackpot surpasses $50,000, the weekly fee is $5,000.

This is how Bella Beats Dance Troupe ended up paying close to $18,000 of approximately $32,000 it raised on a Chase the Ace draw earlier this year, according to organizer Gail Leonardis.

The troupe held a second Chase the Ace this summer, and lost about $3,000, because the ace was drawn so early.

"Some weeks we were handing out $275 to the winner. We were paying the city $300 for our lottery licence fee [that week]," she said.

Leonardis said she brought the issue to the city in 2018, and administration told her the bylaw would be coming up before council for review that fall.

"That didn't happen," she said.

So Leonardis presented a different solution to administration — she pointed out a clause in the bylaw that allows the senior administrative officer to estimate a lottery's prizes, and revise fees based on that estimate.

"What we got back was, 'Well, that wouldn't be fair to the organizations that have already run a Chase the Ace,'" said Leonardis.

"My response to that was, 'But if you change the bylaw now, that's not going to be fair to us anyway.'"

CBC News sent a request to the city asking senior administrative officer Sheila Bassi-Kellett to expand on the reasoning behind holding onto this fee structure. City clerk Debbie Gillard said the city wasn't able to provide a response by press time, but is working to provide more information "as soon as possible."

Fastball league pays $27K in fees

There have been two other major Chase the Ace fundraisers in Yellowknife over the past few years. The longer it lasts, the more lucrative it becomes for the organization hosting it.

In May 2017, the Yellowknife Fastball League raised $258,400 in a Chase the Ace fundraiser that lasted more than 40 weeks, according to treasurer Andy Stewart. The grand-prize winner ended up with almost $300,000, while the city took in $27,600.

The Yellowknife Gymnastics Club held a Chase the Ace the next year, and the winner in that event took home almost $200,000. CBC News wasn't able to find a representative from the gymnastics club to confirm how much it paid in fees.

City sends out survey

Bella Dance's Leonardis made a presentation to city council about the issue in February, and said council was, on the whole, "shocked" to hear how much her dance troupe paid.

Now, the city is inviting the public to give feedback on its review of the lottery licence bylaw. So far, 35 people have taken the survey, and Leonardis confirms she is one of them.

"We're finally just getting a survey [on the proposed changes] out the door," she said.

"I'm a little frustrated at the speed this has gone. I realize it's not a huge top priority, but it's important."

The public has until Nov. 29 to give their feedback. The survey can be found on the city's website.