HARRISBURG -- As the state House prepares to consider extensive changes to the 2004 slots law, a leading legislative foe of gambling wants to make the use of slot machine supplier firms optional rather than mandatory.

State Rep. Paul Clymer, R-Bucks, said he expects the House today to begin debating dozens of changes to the 20-month-old casino law, including his attempt to make a major change in the way the state's 14 new casinos would get their slot machines.

Mr. Clymer wants to eliminate the provision in the 2004 law that makes mandatory the use of new companies called slot machine suppliers, or distributors.

"What do we need the suppliers for?" he asked. "They're just middlemen. We should let slot machine manufacturers sell their machines directly to casinos if they want to. The use of the suppliers should be optional."

No other state with casinos has a requirement about using slots suppliers, which are an intermediate level of companies that would buy the machines -- at about $15,000 each -- add a markup and then re-sell them to casinos.

Supporters of casinos in Pennsylvania, including the two top House Democrats, H. William DeWeese of Waynesburg and Mike Veon of Beaver Falls, have said that requiring the use of slots suppliers will create new companies and thus new jobs in the state.

But the requirement has caused big problems for the state Gaming Control Board, which has been unable to decide if there should be two regions for suppliers to operate in, or whether any licensed supplier should be able to operate statewide. Until that question is resolved, none of the 14 casinos can be licensed by the board.

Even Gov. Ed Rendell, a supporter of casinos, has become frustrated at the licensing delays caused by the dispute over how to license suppliers. He and some legislators have been considering eliminating the supplier provision in the 2004 law. Some slots manufacturers have privately complained about being forced to use suppliers.

Last week, the Gaming Control Board received license applications from 24 groups of would-be supplier/distributors.

One group is headed by former Allegheny County Chief Executive Jim Roddey, while another is headed by ex-Lt. Gov. Mark Singel. A third would-be slots supplier has former city Councilman Sala Udin as a partner.

Mr. Clymer has been an outspoken critic of the 2004 slots law. At a meeting of slots opponents here yesterday, he called casinos "horrible, shameful and disgusting" and said the state would be better off without expanded gambling.

But the General Assembly doesn't appear ready to scrap the casino law entirely.

Some changes are likely, like prohibiting elected officials from owning any stake at all in a casino -- under the current law they can own up to 1 percent -- and another to give Attorney General Tom Corbett more authority to investigate problem casinos.

Besides making slots suppliers optional, Mr. Clymer said he has another change in mind.

He wants to require all 14 casinos to send monthly statements to every gambler who plays slot machines at each casino, listing how much he or she won or lost during the previous month.

Bill Kearney, who described himself as a reformed gambling addict from Philadelphia, said at yesterday's meeting of slots opponents that sending out such statements could help control people's gambling before it gets out of hand, as it did with him in the 1980s.

If a wife or husband finds out -- through the monthly statement -- how much his or her spouse is losing on slot machines, it will cause a domestic dispute but it will also likely reduce a gambler's losses before they become catastrophic, Mr. Kearney said.

"Urge your legislators to support Paul's bill on the monthly statements," he said. "Some gamblers will gamble away the mortgage money, the kid's college tuition or the utility payment."