Alia Beard Rau

The Republic | azcentral.com

Arizona may not be home to billion-dollar Powerball ticket, but the state is a multimillion-dollar winner.

About 26 percent of the money Arizonans spend on Powerball tickets is transferred to state coffers. The past three drawings alone are expected to bring the state more than $12 million.

• Arizonans bought $9.3 million worth of Powerball tickets for the Jan. 6 drawing, earning the state $2.5 million.

• They bought $22 million worth of tickets for the Jan. 9 drawing, earning the state $5.7 million.

• The money from Wednesday's $1.5 billion drawing hasn't yet been tallied, but it is expected to exceed the Jan. 9 numbers.

During the entire last fiscal year, Powerball transferred $27 million in winnings back to the state. Powerball sales vary wildly, depending on the size of the pot. The largest drawing last fiscal year was a February pot worth $564 million.

"A few years ago, player excitement on these games would build as the jackpots approached the $200 million range," according to an August 2015 Lottery Commission report. "Now that excitement level doesn’t occur until the jackpots reach or exceed the $300 million range."

Where the money goes

Arizona statute clearly dictates how lottery revenue is to be spent.

Last fiscal year, revenue from all the lottery games combined resulted in the transfer to state coffers of $176 million.

Here's where that money went:

• General fund: $103.5 million.

• Universities' capital debt: $22.3 million.

• Health programs, including teen-pregnancy prevention; disease prevention; and the women, infants and children food program: $20 million.

• Public transportation: $11.4 million.

• Arizona Game and Fish Commission Heritage Fund: $10 million.

• Arizona Competes job-training fund: $3.5 million.

• Court advocate program for abused and neglected children: $2.9 million.

• Department of Economic Security grants for homeless services: $1 million.

• Gambling-addiction programs: $300,000.

Wiggling room on how to spend some of the money

Most of the amounts are specific designated dollar amounts. So no matter how much money the state gets from the lottery, the health programs will still get $20 million and the homeless programs will still get $1 million. Once the obligations are met, any extra money would go to the debt service payments and the general fund.

The Lottery website brags that millions of dollars in lottery revenue each year go toward Arizona's education system. The site states that "education receives 55.5 percent of the lottery's general fund total." But that's not accurate.

State statute does not designate how the Arizona Legislature must spend the lottery revenue put into the general fund. It's likely that some lottery money goes to education, given that K-12 and higher education make up about half of the general fund budget. But the general fund is one big pot where money comes and goes out, making it impossible to know where a specific dollar from a specific place is then spent.

State and lottery officials conceded that fact in a 2013 Arizona Republic article, but never changed the statement on their website.