Lottery transfers to the Educational Enhancement Trust Fund increased slightly in Fiscal Year 2014-15 to $1.496 billion, or $1 million more than the prior year. The leveling off in transfers is due to a combination of factors including lower overall draw game sales and fewer unclaimed prizes.

Several additional game and product distribution options are available to increase transfers to education. However, some of these options could represent expanded gambling.

The Lottery's operating expense rate continues to meet legislative performance standards and is the second lowest in the nation.

The Lottery should

• continue its efforts to expand the retailer network;
• continue its efforts to improve its data analysis and reporting capabilities for identifying and investigating potential ticket theft or brokering by retailers, as well as increase the number of retailer locations with ticket self-checkers for players;
• continue to regularly assess the effectiveness of its advertising, and if it plans to increase advertising expenditures, evaluate whether the increase will have a net positive effect on returns to the Educational Enhancement Trust Fund; and
• ensure that any future evaluations of advertising return control for additional factors that have a significant influence on sales, use multiple years of data, and separately evaluate returns from advertising draw games and scratch-off games.