State of the Union: A look back at the past week in North America

 Here is iGB's "State of the Union," a summary of the week's most important news stories about sports betting in North America, along with some other stories we found interesting.
 Wrigley Field  DraftKings is a sports book
 An Illinois official gives DraftKings a full mobile licence
 The Illinois Gaming Board gave DraftKings a four-year mobile and store licence on Thursday, April 25. The board did this unanimously.  Since 2019, the company has let people all over the state bet on sports using their phones.  The company also started a sportsbook at Wrigley Field last month.  DraftKings got into the Illinois mobile market for the first time in 2019 through a deal with the Casino Queen in East St. Louis.

 It is the second real-life book at a major sports venue in Chicago, and it is located at Wrigley Field.  In 2022, FanDuel opened a store at United Centre.  Illinois was one of the first places in the US to let companies that offer sports betting work with major sports teams.  This also let customers bet on sports at professional locations.  While it was still called William Hill, Caesars Sportsbook was the first business in the US to open a store at a professional sports site.  In 2020, this took place at the Capital One Arena in Washington, DC.

 Decaying the Tropicana was allowed.
 The building permit for the Tropicana Hotel has been accepted, according to the Las Vegas Review Journal on Wednesday, April 24.  The $48,000 permit from Clark County means that Bally's has until October 20 to tear down the hotel.  Reports say that Bally's will have to pay $15 million to destroy the famous building.  Bally's will use some of the land to build a new baseball field for the Athletics that will hold 33,000 people and cost $1.5 billion.

 Games and Leisure Properties (GLPI) owns the land that the Tropicana is on, but Bally's owns the hotel.  They are going to work together on rebuilding, and GLPI is going to pay $175 million for the demolition and repair.

 NoVig is leaving Colorado.
 In his "Straight to the Point" substack, Steve Ruddock said that Novig is leaving Colorado on April 30.  The operator opened in Colorado in January and says it makes money by charging market makers and skilled bettors instead of regular people.  NoVig doesn't live in any other places.  It told users in a letter that it would "cease operations" and close on April 30.  Customers can still get their money until then.  Any amounts left over after April 30 will be turned into paper checks and sent out.

 "In the spirit of changing the rules of sports betting," the NoVig team wrote, "our team has been working on some huge product updates that will change the game."  We won't say too much about these changes right now, but in a couple of months, we'll let you know the bigger news.

 Wynn NYC's plan for a project gets pushback
 The New York Post reports that a neighbourhood board in New York City spoke out against Wynn Resorts and Related Companies and their plan to build a casino in Hudson Yards.  Community Board 4 (MCB4) of Manhattan wrote in a 12-page letter on April 1 that the Hudson Yards project was first approved in 2009 and had 5,700 housing units.  The present plan for a casino has 1,507 units.

 "The board must make it clear that it cannot support the proposed project's big change from residential to commercial use centred around a casino," it said.  "Related Companies, the applicant, wants to use casino money to pay for the platform over the WRY [Western Rail Yards], so they want to get rid of that plan and replace it with two huge commercial towers, one of which will be a hotel with 1,750 rooms and sit on what would be a 20-story base that would hold a casino."

 Up to three licenses for real-life casinos in downstate areas can be given out.  It is the goal of the New York State Gaming Board to give out the licenses by the end of 2025.

 Read it.
 The issue with sports betting in Iowa is... complicated.  It's been hard to figure out who really misused the data and if it was misused.  The layers were peeled back very well by Albert Samaha, a sports investigative writer for the Washington Post.  He did a great job in his piece of explaining what went wrong and where it happened.  Don't miss this story if you want to learn more about the Iowa scam, what technology is available to keep track of people and bets, or just get a better sense of what's going on.

 In other news...
 The Nebraska Harrah's Columbus will open on May 13.  Late last week, Nebraska's Racing and Gaming Commission set the date for the state's first fixed casino to open.  Three more casinos are already open in temporary buildings.

 PrizePicks also said that Renee White, who used to work for Turner Sports, Bleacher Report, and Warner Brothers Discovery, would be their new chief of people, and Phil Sherwood, who used to be the press officer for the Massachusetts Council on Gaming and Health, would be their new senior director of responsible gaming.

 There is now worry in Ontario about a betting scam that has been going around Canada.  There is advertising for Casino Rama on social media, which is linked to WinSpirit Casino in Curacao. However, the province does not control this.  Customers are being warned by provincial cops to be careful of fake ads for gambling sites.

 With the help of Live! Hospitality and Entertainment, DraftKings will open its third "Sport & Social" on May 9.  Ohio will have the new sports bar and diner.  There won't be any teller windows or kiosks at this site, but DraftKings odds will be shown, and people can bet on the app.  There will be 20 HD TVs and a 37-foot video wall in the room.