Puerto Rico Governor Ricardo Rosselló has signed a bill into law allowing machine games outside casinos.
The measure, passed by the Legislative Assembly in November, gives the stamp of legality to some 25,000 previously gray market machines across the Caribbean island, which functions as a self-governing U.S. Commonwealth.
The law is part of a wider draft of new tax measures introduced by Rosselló in April aimed at providing the hurricane-wracked island with nearly US$2 billion in tax relief over the next five years.
According to the Senate President Thomas Rivera Schatz, the legal machines will generate about $160 million in tax revenue per year, 50 percent of which is earmarked for a police retirement fund and 45 percent for municipalities in need of assistance through an agency that administers an island-wide health insurance system.
