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Where does the money generated by the Idaho Lottery end up?

A viewer asked us to look into how the Idaho Lottery money is divided up for Idaho's public schools.

BOISE, Idaho — The 2020 legislative session has produced a number of proposed bills having to do with taxes, both increasing and eliminating some altogether.

That prompted one viewer to ask this question:

"I was watching your 5:00 pm news... you're talking about taking money from property, sales or gas for various projects. what about the money from the lottery? where does that money go?"

So we looked into it.

For the last 30 years, the Idaho Lottery has historically put 24 cents of every dollar in lottery ticket sales into an account.

Per state law, every year on July 1, that money is split into three accounts: the Department of Education's Bond Levy Equalization Fund, the Public School Building Fund and the Department of Administration's Permanent Building Fund.

The Bond Levy Equalization Fund is used to help pay off the interest on school bonds and the Permanent Building Fund is used to help pay for repairs or to build a new building.

Out of the 24 cents, the Department of Education gets 62.5% or 15 cents.

The Permanent Building Fund gets 37.5% or 9 cents.

In FY2019, the Idaho Lottery returned $60,000,000 to the people of Idaho. 

Here's a look at exactly where that money went, and how each school spent it.

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