Sen. Joe Booth, R-Bridgeville, accused the Markell administration of trying to sneak in one-on-one bets and, in the process, of spending state money, unchecked, for a battle the state recently lost. “Nowhere in the sports-betting legislation does it refer to one-on-one bets,” he said.

In February, Booth introduced House Bill 65 that would require state officials to weigh in with legislators in an effort to keep outside legal counsel costs down. That measure still sits in committee.

“This is another example, in my opinion, of why the Legislature needs to have a check-off list on allowing the administration to go out and hire outside legal counsel. We’re talking big money here. We do not have a open checkbook,” said Booth.

Patterson said arguments before the state Supreme Court were done free of charge by state attorneys. “The legal bills for outside counsel began in July when the leagues sued. Billing that month was $66,022.28. The bulk of activity was in August, including the hearing at which the state prevailed before Judge Sleet and the appeal hearing before the Third Circuit, and legal bills were $392,476.84.,” he said.

The state has yet to receive the legal bills for work in September, said Patterson. He said that work entailed seeking a rehearing by the entire 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. “In evaluating the expenditure of legal fees, also consider the potential upside: that if the state had the flexibility we argued that the federal law allows, it would have meant an additional tens of millions of dollars to the state. In fact, some publicly predicted it would be more than that. Given the stakes involved – for the lottery’s current offerings or for what we had hoped – it was important to vigorously defend the NFL’s threat to a potentially significant source of revenues,” said Patterson.

Booth disagrees.

“One of the problems is that this administration is playing very loose with the facts regarding what was allowed in 1992. That’s what got us into this trouble,” he said. “Outside legal counsel was able to continue to rack up money on this issue and appeal to full district court when they knew they had little or no chance of winning,” he said.

He also said the state is worse off now without the anticipated sports betting revenue.

“Now that Delaware realizes that sports betting money is not going to be there as projected to bail the state out of this economic crisis, we’re not only back to square one, we’re back further behind the line. These decisions put us further in jeopardy,” said Booth.