As Wednesday night's drawing for a record $1.5 billion Powerball jackpot neared, residents and out-of-state travelers showed up in droves to purchase tickets from the last and only store in Arkansas to sell a winning Powerball ticket, workers there said.
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The Crackerbox Food Store No. 25, part of the Valero gas station off Interstate 40 in Mayflower, sold the winning ticket for a comparatively small $25 million jackpot in January 2010.
Harold Bailey of Conway claimed the prize later that month and elected to take the $12 million cash option, which turned into $8,264,462.78 after taxes.
Residents remember the store's previous luck, as do players who are passing through on I-40, the store's manager told ArkansasOnline.
"We get a lot of customers coming in here and saying, 'You were the last place that had [a winner]. It's good luck,'" the manager said. The store reported 166 tickets were sold in just three hours Wednesday morning. A ticket costs $2, plus an extra dollar for a multiplier option that boosts prizes other than the jackpot.
Millions of tickets were sold nationally for Wednesday's drawing. Through Tuesday, the Arkansas lottery had sold $15.2 million in Powerball tickets since Jan. 1, Arkansas Scholarship Lottery Director Bishop Woosley said. That's the most Powerball tickets sold in a month since the lottery was created in 2009. Woosley said the lottery's profit margin on Powerball ticket sales is about 50 percent.
The Arkansas lottery raises funds for college scholarships. Declining revenue in recent years has resulted in reductions in scholarship offerings, and a legislator on the lottery oversight committee said that more than the amount earned in this month's record Powerball sales are needed to boost scholarships.
More than 30,000 college students have received Arkansas Academic Challenge Scholarships during each of the past six fiscal years.
The Legislature has cut the size of the scholarship three times in recent years for future recipients, partly due to the lottery's net proceeds falling short of initial projections. The lottery's revenue and net proceeds have declined during each of the past three fiscal years after peaking in fiscal 2012. But the lottery's revenue and net proceeds during the first six months of fiscal 2016 have increased over the same period in fiscal 2015.
In the most recent change, the Legislature enacted a law last year reducing the amount of the scholarships for future recipients during their first year in college, and changing the eligibility requirements for the scholarship, starting in the 2016-17 school year.
Lottery Oversight Committee Co-Chairman Sen. Jimmy Hickey, R-Texarkana, who sponsored Act 1105 of 2015, said the increased Powerball sales will increase the lottery's net income and "we are thankful of that."
But he said the lottery is a business for which he wants to see 18 months or two years of ticket sales and net proceeds to determine whether the increases in both are a long-term trend before considering increasing the scholarships.
Under Act 1105 of 2015, the scholarship size for future recipients will be reduced from $2,000 to $1,000 for the freshman year at the participating two- and four-year colleges. The scholarships will increase from $3,000 to $4,000 for the sophomore year at four-year colleges and from $2,000 to $3,000 for the sophomore year at two-year colleges. Scholarship recipients will receive $4,000 as juniors and $5,000 as seniors at the four-year colleges.
Act 1105 also requires high school graduates to have ACT scores of at least 19 or the equivalent on comparable college entrance exams to be eligible for a scholarship. High school graduates previously were required to have completed the Smart Core curriculum and achieved either a high school grade-point average of at least 2.5 or a minimum score of 19 on the ACT or its equivalent.
Supporters of Act 1105 said it would shift scholarship money to students who completed their studies and help guard against the scholarship program running short of funds. Critics said it would hurt students from low-income families or minority groups.
"If everybody will stay conservative, we can see how much extra is in there to give more money for the second year or third year" on a yearly basis, Hickey said.
House Speaker Jeremy Gillam, R-Judsonia, said he doesn't know whether the scholarships should be adjusted based on increased Powerball ticket sales.
"This might be fleeting or temporary to make an adjustment on the amount," he said.
Woosley tweeted late Wednesday that the lottery sold $5.9 million in tickets that day, after breaking Saturday's daily record of $4.4 million, when the jackpot was $900 million.
Lottery officials said that nationally, 85.8 percent of possible number combinations had been selected by midday, increasing the chances that someone would win the world's largest lottery jackpot. But the odds of winning were still extraordinarily slim, at 1 in 292.2 million.
If someone matched all the winning numbers, the jackpot would be paid in annual payments over 29 years, or the winner could opt for a lump-sum payment of $930 million. Winners have to pay 39.6 percent of the prize in federal income taxes, in addition to any state or local income taxes.
If a winner does not come forward after Wednesday night's drawing, the estimated jackpot for Saturday's drawing will increase to $2 billion, or a lump-sum value of $1.24 billion before taxes, according to Kelly Cripe with the Texas Lottery, which currently manages the multistate Powerball game. Estimated jackpot amounts, which are released daily, have been steadily rising since Nov. 4, when the jackpot was reset at $40 million.
Powerball tickets are sold in 44 states, as well as the District of Columbia, the U.S. Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico.
But residents in the six states that don't participate are finding ways to get their hands on tickets. Some of the biggest Powerball sales have come from cities bordering states that don't sell the tickets, according to the Multi-State Lottery Association. The association oversees the Powerball Lottery, but management rotates annually among member states.
Woosley said three stores in Lake Village are among the lottery's top five retailers selling Powerball tickets. Customers include Mississippi residents who are crossing the state line to buy Powerball tickets in Arkansas. Mississippi doesn't have a lottery.
At the store in Mayflower, customer Rhonda Carter said she was surprised to hear that the business sold a previous jackpot winner. She said she had other reasons for choosing that location.
"The last time I came in [the clerk] said 'Have a blessed day,' so I figured I'd buy one from him," Carter said, before adding, "Plus my church needs a new [building]."
Information for this article was contributed by staff members of The Associated Press.
Metro on 01/14/2016