BANGOR (AP) – A faltering campaign to force a statewide vote on a proposal to ban slot machines in Maine has received an eleventh-hour boost from two conservative Christian groups.

The Christian Civic League of Maine and the Maine Grassroots Coalition have allied themselves with No Slots for ME!, a group trying to collect the 50,519 voter signatures needed to put the measure on the ballot next year.

The anti-gambling group has been conducting the campaign for 11 months, but is still roughly 25,000 signatures short of its goal and faces an Oct. 4 deadline for submitting petitions.

With experience in citizen petition campaigns, the Christian Civic League of Maine and the Maine Grassroots Coalition provide the anti-gambling effort with volunteers and a network of contacts in 200 evangelical churches across Maine.

The two groups recently collected enough signatures to force a vote this November on whether to repeal Maine’s new gay rights law.

The only place in Maine that now allows slot machines is Bangor, where Penn National Gaming plans to open a temporary site with 475 machines this fall before establishing a permanent racino at Bangor Raceway.

Participants launched the revived petition campaign Friday in front of the Hollywood Slots site on Main Street, where one gambling foe was dressed in a homemade slot machine costume.

Penn National declined to comment on the rally or the petition campaign.

Gambling opponents expressed concern that gambling will spread from Bangor to other parts of the state, putting families at risk. They said any economic benefit from slot machines will be outweighed by the social costs associated with problem gambling.

“What happens in Bangor isn’t going to stay in Bangor,” George Rodrigues, president of No Slots for ME!, said in a poke at Las Vegas’ familiar slogan. He pointed to efforts to introduce slots in Washington County and said there has been talk about trying to bring them to Sanford.

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