Legislation to allow voters to decide whether to authorize an Alabama lottery and other forms of state regulated gambling is headed to a conference committee.

The Alabama Senate on Tuesday voted to send the two bills, HB151 and HB152, to a committee of three senators and three representatives to seek a compromise between the much different plans passed by the House and the Senate.

Tuesday’s vote was the first action on the high-profile legislation since the House did the same thing on April 4, voting to send the bills to a conference committee.

If the conference committee approves a compromise, it would go to the full House and full Senate, where it would take three-fifths of senators and three-fifths of representatives to pass and send to the ballot for voters, who have the final say on any bills for a lottery or other expansion of legal gambling.

Alabama voters rejected a lottery in 1999. Lottery plans have been proposed many times since then but none have reached the ballot.

The House passed the gambling package first, on Feb. 15. It included a lottery, 10 casinos, including four that would be operated by the Poarch Band of Creek Indians, and legal sports betting.

Three weeks later, the Senate approved a scaled-back plan that included a lottery but no sports betting, and no casinos other than three operated by the Poarch Creeks. Instead of full-scale casinos, the Senate plan would allow pari-mutuel gambling on horse racing and dog racing, simulcast races, and computerized historical horse racing machines at the state’s four former greyhound tracks and three other locations.

Both plans called for a gambling commission to regulate gambling statewide and for a compact with the Poarch Band. Both plans would repeal 17 local constitutional amendments allowing bingo in certain counties and put all gambling under regulation of the new commission.

The Senate conferees on the two bills are Senate Minority Leader Bobby Singleton, D-Greensboro, Sen. Greg Albritton, R-Atmore, and Sen. Garlan Gudger, R-Cullman.

The House conferees are Reps. Chris Blackshear, R-Phenix City, the sponsor of the two bills, Rep. Sam Jones, D-Mobile, and Rep. Andy Whitt, R-Harvest, who led an ad hoc committee that worked more than a year to develop the legislation.