NC's Embattled Lottery hires new Head from New Mexico (Concern?)

[KoKo]

(I was opposed to NC instituting a lottery and it passed by a slim margin with some shenanigans at the last minute with NC Senate. I wonder about this new head of the lottery and will cross post in the NM Forum in case there's something we need to know about Shaheen. Any New Mexicans know anything about Shaheen?)
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The Associated Press

North Carolina has put the future of its new lottery in the hands of a former head of the New Mexico Lottery who has helped launch lotteries in three other states.

The state lottery commission selected Tom Shaheen, the immediate past president of the North American lottery association, at a meeting today. He will be paid a base salary of $235,000 and get a $50,000 bonus if he can get the lottery started within four months of beginning his new job. He is expected to begin work within 30 days.

Shaheen, 52, resigned Tuesday after five years in New Mexico. He helped start lotteries in Florida, Texas and Georgia.

In New Mexico, he streamlined the staff to save more than $1 million a year. He also renegotiated a contract with the lottery company, GTECH Holdings of Rhode Island, and saved $12 million over three years, said former lottery chairwoman Claydean Claiborne.He joins a North Carolina lottery that has struggled early with ethics concerns. Attorney General Roy Cooper is investigating potential lobbying law violations by a former lottery commissioner and a former aide to House Speaker Jim Black, D-Mecklenburg, who was hired by lottery company Scientific Games Corp. Scientific Games and one of its vice presidents are also being investigated.

Shaheen, who attended the commission meeting with his wife, said later that concerns about the resignations of three lottery commissioners since the board was formed in September didn't influence his decision to come to North Carolina.

"I'm here to raise as much money as we possibly can for all the great education programs" in the state, Sheehan said.


http://www.newsobserver.com/114/story/368227.html