The closest state-lottery outlet to Las Vegas is at the convenience store at Primm. Conveniently and not coincidentally, it’s right across the border in California (roughly 40 miles southwest of Las Vegas).
It’s perennially the California Lottery’s leading retail outlet. It’s placed number one, out of the more than 18,000 state lottery outlets, in sales nearly every year since it opened in 1992 (the convenience store at Hallelujah Junction, 30 miles north of Reno, takes that honor in the odd year). So it’s not surprising that the name of the store is the Primm Valley Lotto Store. In really good years, this store nearly doubles the amount of the second highest outlet’s sales.
To get there, just put yourself on Interstate 15 heading southwest toward Los Angeles. Get off at Primm and keep heading south; the market is just south of the state line past the Outlet Mall.
When you walk in, you’ll immediately notice that this place is loaded for high-volume lottery mania, with a half-dozen or so Lotto ticket machines behind the counter, several self-serve Lotto machines, and a few scratcher-ticket dispensers. Even so, when there’s some jackpot excitement, lines for tickets can snake out the door and around the building.
For example, when the multi-state MegaMillions jackpot recently hit $380 million, the line was more than two hours long.
As far as the games go, you can play MegaMillions, SuperLotto Plus, Fantasy 5, Daily 4, Daily 3, Scratchers, Daily Derby, and yadda yadda. Definitely visit the website at www.callottery.com, where the games are explained. With so much turnover at the Lotto Store, it’s good to know what you want to play and how to do it when you get to the counter, so you don’t look like a rube or hold up the line.
In order for Nevada to institute a lottery, lawmakers and residents have to vote to change the state constitution, which outlaws it. Both the Nevada Assembly and Senate have to vote in favor of a lottery in two successive sessions (taking four years); then the voters have to approve it.
We’d say that you have a better chance of hitting MegaMillions than Nevada has of getting a lottery.
In 2009, a bill to institute a lottery passed the Assembly by a vote of 31-11, but died a quick, painless, and not unexpected death in the Senate. The Government Affairs Committee chairman took a straw poll, then never even introduced the bill to committee members to consider it.
That was the 25th time since 1973 that the Nevada Legislature has killed dead a lottery resolution. Not a chance in hell. Never a breath of life. Over the casinos’ stiff corpses. At the risk of repeating ourselves: dead dead dead.
Of course, a lottery bill is already being planned for this year’s legislative session.
