Good Question: How much money do schools get from NY lotto?

ROCHESTER, N.Y. (WHEC) — We received a Good Question about helping schools fix their budget shortfalls.

Phyllis sent News10NBC’s Brennan Somers an email saying: "Gov. Cuomo collected monies from the New York State Lotteries. It was supposed to help support the schools and eventually make our school taxes cheaper. What happened to all the monies?"

It’s something we’ve looked at before. This issue is coming back up again as schools look for ways to stay afloat during the pandemic while facing a 20% hit to their bottom line due to state cuts.

So here’s how the lotto works and how much it helps schools in New York.

The winners get the biggest cut of all the money for the game — about 60%. The second-largest split, which is about a third, goes to the state’s education system.

It goes off a formula, the same used to give out other state aid.

The gaming commission doesn’t get to single out one struggling district over another.

RCSD does already get more than most. It received $68 million dollars in 2018-2019 bringing the lifetime total to $1.2 billion.

The issue here? The budget for Rochester schools runs about a billion per year.

Some lawmakers have spent years trying to increase how much lotto money goes to schools by taking away how much is set aside for prizes.

There’s also another bill in the New York State Senate that would raise the rate by 5%. It’s been bounced around for years and remains stuck in committee.

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