The Beach Poker Room temporarily closed due to ‘unfortunate circumstances’

A Virginia Beach poker parlor temporarily closed its doors — again.

The Beach Poker Room, which previously closed in July, just celebrated its reopening in September.

“Due to many unfortunate circumstances … Beach Poker Room is Temporary (sic) closed,” the business posted on its Facebook page this month. “We are all very grateful for the support you have shown us over these past few years. Now we ask you to stay in contact as we work towards a solution.”

The reason for the closure is unclear. But Virginia recently began cracking down on charitable gaming. Under a new state law, those who conduct charitable gaming without a permit can be hit with fines of $25,000 to $50,000. Some, meanwhile, argue the crackdown is harming legitimate charities; others believe tighter regulations were needed.

It’s unclear who runs the Beach Poker Room. Its website states it was opened in 2020.

On its Facebook page, the poker room is described as a charity organization. The group, however, is not listed on GuideStar, the website that maintains a database of IRS-recognized nonprofits.

The poker room told The Virginian-Pilot it offered charitable gaming, but did not respond to a question about its charity status on GuideStar.

The Virginia Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services, known as VDACS, which regulates and monitors charitable gaming, declined to comment on the closure.

The poker room did not respond to an inquiry from The Pilot about the reason for its shutdown. However, in a cryptic message sent from its Facebook page, the business seemingly questioned why other establishments offering poker in Virginia Beach continued to operate.

Tad Berman, a self-described “citizen watchdog” who has taken aim at establishments he believes are falsely claiming to be charitable gaming organizations, said he wasn’t surprised by the closure.

The poker room routinely and openly advertised on its social media page that it was continuing to hold poker games even after the new fines went into effect, he said, and therefore should have expected to have drawn attention from authorities.

Berman, a horse racing fan and retired bouncer, often attends state meetings on gaming and speaks with legislators about his concerns. He also runs a Facebook group dedicated to discussing integrity in gaming.

Berman said it’s disappointing that Virginia Beach resident Amy Solares, vice chair of the state’s Charitable Gaming Board, which oversees charitable gaming, has ties to the poker room.

“She should know better as a member of the board,” said Berman, who lives in Richmond.

Solares, who is running for a seat on the Virginia Beach School Board, said she doesn’t have ties to the poker room. The only connection is that a charitable gaming group that she has a financial interest in and the poker room are tenants in the same building.

The partnership she has a “limited interest” in — which she declined to name — runs charitable bingo games out of The Bingo Palace, where the poker room also held its games.

A private landlord, whom Solares declined to name, owns the building and sublets it to different entities. She also stressed that she’s never been involved in any form of illegal gambling.

Solares said Berman has been “constantly trying to shut charitable gaming down,” including the legitimate organizations. Berman, however, said he only wants to ensure that all gaming is lawfully conducted.

“I like playing poker, but if we are going to have (charitable gaming) it needs to be done legally,” he said. “You have to watch it like a hawk. When there’s all this money involved, there will always be people trying to get their hands on it.”

But Solares said some charitable gaming establishments haven’t been able to obtain the permits required to avoid a massive fine. VDACS, she said, appears to be “inadequate and unprepared” to handle the permitting process for charitable poker.

That isn’t the case for charitable bingo though, Solares said, likely because it was legalized decades ago in the commonwealth. (The state didn’t move to legalize charitable games of Texas Hold ‘em poker until 2020.)

A recent report from the Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission, which conducts research on behalf of the General Assembly, agrees with Solares: It concluded that VDACS is ill-equipped to oversee charitable gaming.

“Regulating charitable gaming is a minor function for VDACS, whose primary purposes are to promote growth of Virginia agriculture, provide consumer protection, and encourage environmental stewardship,” the report states. “VDACS does not have enough staff to conduct a sufficient number of audits or inspections of organizations that sponsor charitable gaming.”

The report states the department has 21 positions dedicated to charitable gaming but says 10 of the positions are empty and “have been difficult to fill.”

In addition to VDACS, two other state agencies also regulate gaming: the Virginia Lottery oversees the state lottery and casinos, while the Virginia Racing Commission monitors live horse racing and horse-racing machines.

The state report, instead, recommended establishing a single state agency to regulate all gaming, except for live horse racing. It stated that the Virginia Lottery could best fulfill this central role.

Meanwhile, regardless of the reason behind its shutdown, it appears the Beach Poker Room will be missed. More than a dozen of the establishment’s clientele responded to the Facebook announcement with comments lamenting the closure. One commenter slammed the state.

“Virginia needs to get all this gambling (stuff) straight seriously this is getting very annoying,” a Facebook user identified as Bill Thruman wrote.

Some Virginia Beach legislators agree with that sentiment.

Del. Glenn Davis called the charitable gaming fines “crazy and absurd” and said he believes the General Assembly is catering to the newly legal casino industry at the expense of local charities.

“They’ve made it almost impossible for charitable organizations to hold the type of fundraising that they’ve been doing to create an advantage for the corporate casinos,” said Davis, a Republican. “This is clearly a David and Goliath situation.”

Del. Tim Anderson, R-Virginia Beach, said he also voted against the fines because he didn’t want to create more challenges for charities. But he also acknowledged there were problems within the charitable gaming community.

“Often times the providers walked away with a substantially bigger cut than the charities themselves,” Anderson wrote in an email. “There was a desire amongst many of the members of the General Assembly to bring balance to this equation. However, what we ended up with is not better in my opinion.”

The delegate said he hopes the legislature will gut the current gaming laws and start over during the next legislative session.

Another type of gaming — skill games — has also become a point of contention in the commonwealth.

Skill games resemble slot machines, but winners are not determined solely on luck; users have to interact with the game. In the past few years, Virginia has gone back and forth on whether skill games are allowed.

A court hearing later this year will decide the matter.

Katie King, katie.king@virginiamedia.com