Tennessee Charitable Gaming

The Tennessee Charitable Gaming Implementation Law established the framework for charitable gaming. The Division of Charitable Solicitations and Gaming (DCSG), an office reporting to the Tennessee Secretary of State, provides the infrastructure so that qualified charitable organizations may conduct annual charitable events. Authorized charitable games include raffles, reverse raffles, cakewalks and cake wheels. The Division does not permit bingo, pull-tabs, punchboards, keno, casino games such as slot machines and roulette wheels, or any instant or online lottery game operated by the state Lottery.

To be eligible as a charitable organization in Tennessee, the organization must be recognized as exempt from federal income tax by the Internal Revenue Service in accordance with IRC 501(c) (3). The organization must be active and in existence within Tennessee for at least five years. All organizations must be approved by a two-thirds vote of the state's General Assembly. Before conducting any charitable event, the charitable organization must file an application with the DCSG. Application filing fees are nonrefundable and the cost is dependent on the amount of gross proceeds earned from the event. The fee can be as low as $150 for events with gross receipts of $5,000 or less and as high as $600 for events grossing $20,000 or more. An organization is required to file a financial report no more than 90 days after the annual event date. If the total revenue received from the event exceeds $50,000, an audited financial statement is also required.

Only one event may be held by a charitable organization during an event period, which starts on 1 July and continues until 30 June. An event may only be held in a county where the organization has a physical location or a county adjacent to that physical location. A single location may not host more than two charitable organizations' events a month.