2002 - Harness Tracks of America, Inc.

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
MORE GOOD NEWS AT THE SPA
HTA’s member Saratoga Equine Sports Center
had more good news over the weekend, when five
committee members of the Saratoga County Board
of Supervisors voted unanimously to approve VLTs
for the track. The full board, whose new chairman
has put off a scheduled January meeting until February
13, still has to give its approval, but things
are looking up.
Good news in Chicago, too, where horsemen boycotting
the entry box, resulting in the loss of 4
nights and 43 races -- came to a settlement with
Maywood and Balmoral Parks. Under the agreement,
the tracks will guarantee $90,000 a night in
purse distribution for the year, with a kick-out
clause if wagering drops by 25% or more a night,
and the horsemen agreed to three 9-horse fields a
night at Maywood Park, at claiming levels no
higher than $12,000. Racing resumed Saturday
night.
MASS. PHONE BETS BY APRIL
It may be no April Fool’s Day this year at HTA’s
Plainridge Racecourse, if Massachusetts Racing
Commission chairman Robert Hutchinson can
keep the advent of phone account wagering on
schedule. Hutchinson told Ed Gray of the Boston
Herald that he hopes that the way will be cleared
by then for each of the state’s four racetracks to
get their own systems underway. Hutchinson said,
“I expect that it will go in for a hearing in the next
30 days and hope to have it in operation on or before
April 1. Everyone’s signed off on it, but we
still have to do the drill.” Under the new legislation,
each track will be able to accept wagers by
phone on all tracks that are offered on its simulcast
menu that day. There will be no change in
premiums paid for intratrack signals in the
state, and payoffs will be the same on account
wagering as at the track.
January 7, 2002
NJ AWAITS SUBSIDY VOTE
The New Jersey Assembly was scheduled to vote
today, on the final voting session before a new legislature
takes over in Trenton, on the $18 million
dollar purse subsidy needed to keep the state’s
tracks competitive. No word at press time.
HOPE, AND SURPRISES, IN KY
Janet Patton, the Lexington Herald-Leader’s
Eclipse award-winning business writer, thinks a
potential $532 million budget shortfall in the state
bodes well for VLTs at tracks in Kentucky. She
thinks the issue is important enough that she hied
herself off to Toronto to see Woodbine, and returned
to write that the biggest winner in racing
these days isn’t Point Given or Storm Cat, Bob
Baffert or D. Wayne Lukas, but Woodbine. Ms.
Patton says the legislative jockeying on the issue
starts tomorrow, and noted that Kentucky’s shrine
of purity, Keeneland -- which didn’t even have a
race announcer until they hired harness racing’s
Kurt Becker a few years ago -- now is ready to
accept slots. Track president Nick Nicholson says,
“To say ‘we don’t want it’is no longer a responsible
position to take.” Ms. Patton quoted Kentucky
governor Paul Patton, who said “I normally
don’t make comment on specific bills until I see
them, but I would not be inclined to veto an action
by the General Assembly that they already convinced
me that they have enough votes to pass.”
Whether the Assembly has enough is uncertain,
but Kentucky tracks obviously are starting to lose
their coyness in discussing the matter. Ms.
Patton’s Eclipse, it turns out, will be presented at
the Fountainbleau instead of the shiny new Diplomat,
which isn’t ready. We could have warned the
NTRA if asked. HTA was to have met at the Diplomat
in 2001, but switched to 2003 when that spectacular
new twin tower venture wasn’t finished.
It still isn’t, plagued by leaks, embarrassing
since it is owned by the plumbers’ union.