2002 - Harness Tracks of America, Inc.

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HARNESS TRACKS OF AMERICA Executive Newsletter A daily fax and e-mail report on racing and gaming developments in North America and beyond Stanley F. Bergstein, Editor BATAVIA GETS LICENSE, IN HTA After a long and persistent legislative and competitive battle, Western Regional OTB has received its license from the New York Racing and Wagering Board to operate live and simulcast racing at Batavia Downs, and plans to open an 85-night meeting July 29. When it does, it will once again fly the flag of Harness Tracks of America, returning Batavia to the fold as HTA’s 36th member. President and GM Marty Basinait, who had Western OTB buy Batavia for $2.5 million and then led the fight in Albany and elsewhere to have it licensed, will join the HTA board as Batavia’s director. The track recently received county approval to install state-sanctioned VLTs, and will incorporate them into its operation as soon as the state resolves legal challenges to them. GLAZER’S DAD FILES HUGE SUIT Samuel Glazer, co-founder of Mr. Coffee and father of Bob Glazer, perenially one of harness racing’s leading owners, has filed a billion dollar lawsuit in Cleveland against Lehman Brothers and SG Cowen Corporation. The suit accuses those firms of allowing Frank Gruttadauria to conduct a 15-year financial scam and asks for $500 million in punitive damages against each firm and $40 million in actual losses. Gruttadauria, who law enforcement agencies had been unable to find for a month, surrendered on February 9. The SEC filed fraud charges against him last week, accusing him of stealing at least $40 million from more than 50 clients. Glazer’s attorney said his client had invested $7 million with Gruttadauria in July, 1998, and had account statements from Lehman representing his account to be worth $24 million when it actually contained only $15,000. Lehman offered to return only the original $7 million. A Cleveland grocery chain operator also sued Lehman for losses of $26 million. March 1, 2002 FLORIDA SLOTS TO FULL HOUSE Pompano Park -- and Florida’s 30 other racing and jai alai operations -- have something to savor this weekend, after a bill to allow VLTs passed a final House committee and advanced to the floor of the full House. A similar Senate bill bogged down in committee, but should be heard next week. The House bill’s chief sponsor, Democratic representative Ron Greenstein, says the bill will put $641 million into Florida education. A Key Largo legislator, Rep. Ken Sorensen, said, “In these days, that’s kind of hard to look away from.” AS STATED IN LAS VEGAS.... Attendees at last week’s Racing Congress in Las Vegas were told that smart cards and other technological advances in coming years would make reception of racing statistics and signals ubiquitous, in cars, offices, homes, everywhere. Evidence of the accuracy of that prediction came quickly, with the announcement of a company called Performance Technology that it had contracted with another called eConnect to produce a PlayersCash smart card that will allow electronic cash transfers to be sent through the Internet to either open or replenish an OTB track betting account. The company said the combination of the new smart card and a PIN will act as a comprehensive authentication device for defining the age and location of the player, and lends itself toward implementation of other home gaming services. IN THE NEWS.... SKIP CARLSON has been named general manager of the Saratoga Equine Sports Center...Delaware county fair’s Lady Pace on Sept. 14 will honor HTA vice president LAVERNE HILL, president of Mid-America at Scioto Downs... HTA sends condolences to Newark Star-Ledger harness columnist RAY BRIENZA on the death of his wife, Una.
HARNESS TRACKS OF AMERICA Executive Newsletter A daily fax and e-mail report on racing and gaming developments in North America and beyond Stanley F. Bergstein, Editor FOR THE RACING CHEMISTS The editor’s Daily Racing Form column on EPO and its derivatives, in online editions of Friday and the print edition of Saturday, apparently touched the nerves of some members of the AORC, the organization of racing chemists. They were spending valuable research time discussing it on their chat lines, with one comment noting that I had missed last week’s stories from Great Britain of a surprise dawn search of six jump training centers, resulting in 408 tests for EPO, all coming up empty. I had not missed the stories, nor the follow-up story by Jonathon Powell in The Mail in which he wrote that he had “uncovered fresh evidence of the trade in the illegal and performance-enhancing drug EPO, which can be used to boost a horse’s stamina.” Powell went on to write, “One of the most successful jump trainers in the business revealed to me yesterday that six weeks ago he was offered unlimited supplies by one of his own stable lads, who had previously held a trainer’s license.....He indicated that he could get the EPO from Spain via a contact in this country (Great Britain).” Last year, in New Jersey, state police found more than 200 bottles of EPO on the farm of now-suspended trainer Richard Chansky. EPO, it appears, is in plentiful supply on both sides of the Atlantic, and in the hands of horsemen. If the racing chemists do not think it is a high priority to develop a test for this stuff that will stand legal challenges -- which was the gist of the Racing Form column -- the editor still does. SWIATEK A WILD THING The HTA office receives calls from time to time asking about the whereabouts of John Swiatek, president of HTA from 1994 to 1996. It turns out he is an owner of the newly established Washington Wild Things, an independent professional baseball team that will play 84 games in the 12-team Frontier League this season, starting May 29. March 4, 2002 Swiatek, managing partner of the new team, is having the time of his life. The team formerly was the Canton, Ohio, Crocodiles, and the first thought after purchase was to rename them the Washington Generals, since their home base is Washington, PA, hard by The Meadows, which Swiatek ran. Recalling the team that carried that name through countless seasons as the Harlem Globetrotters’ foils, the Generals was discarded and the Wild Things adopted. Kent Tekulve, who pitched for the Pittsburgh Pirates from 1975 to 1985, after which he played four more seasons with the Philadelphia Phillies, is the Wild Things Director of Baseball Operations. Ross Vechhio, who served in both the St. Louis Cardinals and Montreal Expos organizations, is general manager, and Joe Charboneau, rookie of the year with the Cleveland Indians in 1980, is the team’s hitting coach. Swiatek also is an investor in a water technology company that specializes in water line infrastructures, and does racing consulting. His team will play in a brand new facility at the intersection of routes 70 and 79, less than three miles from The Meadows. HOW BIG? THIS BIG How big is the Internet gambling business these days? Big enough that online casinos have become the fifth largest ad buyer on the Internet, according to a Jupiter Media Metrix study. The company says online casinos “are now competing for advertising mindshare with the most visible industries, including retail, financial services and travel.” In another development of interest to all track operators, the March issue of Wired magazine features a long story called “The High Tech Trifecta”, with a subhead reading, “They’ve got multimillion-dollar bankrolls, lightning-fast networks, and a probability-crunching system that leaves the odds in the dust. Meet the parimutuel fund managers who are redefining horse racing.” It’s fascinating reading. and we have copies.
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2002 - Harness Tracks of America, Inc.

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