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Topeka — Democrats in the Kansas Senate on Tuesday called for the firing of lottery workers who produced an off-color "Girls of the Lottery" inner-office Web site and, more recently, approved a radio commercial heavy on sexual innuendo and racial stereotypes.

The ad, broadcast statewide for two weeks, was pulled shortly after the hearing.

"Any action short of termination for these individuals is insufficient," said Senate Minority Leader Anthony Hensley, D-Topeka, minutes after images from the site were shared with members of the Senate Ways and Means Committee.

The Web site portrays five female lottery workers as participants in a mock telephone-sex advertisement. Another page on the Web site features a photograph of Tom Hofts, marketing director at the lottery, posing as Adolph Hitler in front of a Nazi flag above the words "Der Webmaster."

"This Hitler thing is what's most egregious for me," Hensley said. "The 'Girls of the Lottery' that's unseemly, but how can you look at those swastikas and that flag and think that's funny or that it was just people having fun?"

At the request of Democrat committee members, some of the images were briefly projected on a screen for lawmakers and onlookers to view.

Caribbean Stud

The radio commercial features a man's voice promoting a new scratch-ticket game called "Caribbean Stud," a takeoff on a poker hand.

The man, who calls himself Enrique "the true Caribbean Stud," a reference to his sexual prowess, asks the listener to consider whether the new game has "bulging pectoral muscles like Enrique?" and "does it make women all giddy with its God-like bronzed skin?"

Answering his own questions, the man, speaking with a Spanish accent, says, "I do not think so. I would like to see this lottery game slip into leopard-skin bikini briefs and look as fabulous as Enrique Phillipe San Jussepi."

Testifying before the Senate budget committee, lottery director Ed Van Petten said he was unaware of the advertisement's sexual overtones.

An hour after the hearing, Van Petten ordered the commercial taken off the air.

In a letter hand-delivered after the meeting to committee member Sen. Jim Barone, D- Frontenac, Van Petten wrote:

"I certainly apologize to you and the State of Kansas for any embarrassment caused by this advertising campaign. Future commercials such as this will be watched and listened to very carefully to avoid even the appearance of impropriety in this regard."

Women offended

During the committee hearing, Barone said he had heard from women in his district who were offended by the ad.

"I appreciated Mr. Van Petten's prompt response I think he's a good, honest man who's sincere in his efforts to do what's right," Barone said. "But at the same time, I'm dismayed that this kind of thing is still going on. I think this proves the Kansas Lottery is still worthy of a lot of oversight."

Sen. Nancey Harrington, R-Goddard, said the ad raised questions about the lottery's work environment. Harrington chairs the Senate Federal and State Affairs Committee, which is reviewing a bill to extend the lottery's life, and she has publicly praised Van Petten's candor.

"Does anybody get it?" Harrington asked. "There are sexual harassment allegations. There are complaints about pornography on computers in the work place."

Van Petten, who was named lottery director in October, said he's either warned or reprimanded workers involved in the creation of the Web site.

Also, he said, an internal investigation found that the internal Web site was developed three or four years ago when workers were experimenting with software used in creating the lottery public Web site. The five women whose pictures were used, he said, were willing participants.

Van Petten said the picture of Hofts posing as Hitler had been altered by computer and was done so without Hofts' knowledge.

No one at the lottery has been fired for their involvement with the Web site, Van Petten said, adding that it would be inappropriate because the incidents happened more than three years ago and before his arrival.

'Troubling inconsistency'

But Sen. Paul Feleciano, D-Wichita, said Van Petten's words don't match his actions.

"On one hand we're being told this has been taken care of and that it was all long ago," Feleciano said. "And then we find out the lottery's been running a radio ad that reflects those attitudes of the past. There is an inconsistency to this that I find to be very troubling."

Republicans say they, too, are troubled by the release of the images on the "Girls of the Lottery" Web site. But it's not the Legislature's business, they say, to decide whether someone should be fired.

"I think we have to give Ed Van Petten the benefit of the doubt and hope he gets the agency's problems turned around," said Sen. Sandy Praeger, R-Lawrence.

Tuesday's hearings brought the sternest questioning from lawmakers yet this session about lottery operations, which have been the subject of several days' worth of hearings in both House and Senate committees.

Lawmakers are considering whether to reauthorize the lottery, which is scheduled to expire next year, unless they act to extend it.