IRB Nixes Arlington Request to Trim Programs

The Illinois Racing Board June 23, amid warnings the state's racing industry is at "death's door," narrowly refused to let Arlington International Racecourse trim its daily programs to fewer than eight races.

 

The board did, however, approve Arlington's request for more flexibility in carding races—a step horsemen said will hurt breeders, owners, and trainers.

 

The five-hour meeting in downtown Chicago was packed with owners and trainers.

 

Arlington asked the board to modify the 2015 dates order to permit daily cards of fewer than eight races—the minimum specified in that order. Arlington expands its racing from three days per week to four during July and August and faces a shortage of horses on the backstretch, Arlington general manager Tony Petrillo said. He also said $300,000 in state funding remains in limbo because of a legislative stalemate, handle is down 18% from last year and horses are not shipping north from Kentucky as they used to at the end of the Churchill Downs meeting.

 

Those and other factors, he said, are "trends that will lead us to the some type of extinction" without intervention.

 

Petrillo said the Arlington is projecting a $1.4 million purse overpayment by the end of the meeting in September if it continues to pay the current $127,000 daily. He said Arlington chose program reductions over alternative solutions, including a purse reduction, trimming stakes purses, elimination of six racing days in September or carding lower-quality races will smaller purses.

 

He held out the possibility that races trimmed from weekday programs might be added back to weekend cards. But he admitted the overall goal was to reduce the overall payment of overnight purses.

 

"If this request is not approved," Petrillo said, "the next likely step would be a purse cut." That, he said, "would put us at the bottom of the list" relative to neighboring states, most of which have alternative revenue sources such as slot machines.

 

Horsemen argued emphatically that a purse reduction, even as much as 20%, would be less onerous than reducing daily racing opportunities.

 

"If purses have to be cut, we will support you on that," said Glen Berman, executive director of the Illinois Thoroughbred Horsemen's Association. "There is no reason to take this type of drastic action. These projections, if they are true, can be dealt with in a much more common-sense way."

 

"On an eight-race day, fans think you're running an abbreviated card," Berman said. If offered fewer races with additional featured simulcasting, he predicted, "They will say, 'I don't have to come here to watch races on television. I can do that at home.' "

 

Berman suggested Arlington and the horsemen meet weekly to review the status of the purse account and make adjustments if and as needed later in the meeting.

 

ITHA vice president Chris Block said a purse cut likely would not affect the already depressed quality of racing in the state.

 

"It's so low now, how is it going to change the product?" Block said. "It's not going to affect the quality of those races. Everybody around the country knows this is at death's door. ... We're just trying to keep our heads above water and hope and pray that we get a gaming bill."

 

The Illinois General Assembly is considering legislation to expand gaming in the state. The current proposal would permit tracks to have not only slot machines but also table games. Both the state and the City of Chicago are facing horrendous budget shortfalls, and Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel is lobbying strongly for a Chicago Loop casino as part of expansion. However, the legislature and Gov. Bruce Rauner are locked in a bitter dispute over revenue hikes, including gaming, and government reform and no resolution is likely soon.

 

"This is a real sensitive time for us," Berman said, referring to the legislative negotiations.

 

The IRB also debated whether Arlington's contract with the ITHA would permit reduction of programs to fewer than eight races even with IRB approval and whether such cuts would disqualify Arlington from receiving "dark day" simulcast revenue.

 

After hours of testimony and questioning, the proposal failed with five "yea" votes and six "nays".

 

Arlington also sought emergency action to permit Racing Secretary Chris Polzin to use his discretion is replacing canceled races from the condition book from the published list of substitute races.

 

Petrillo said the current rule precludes Polzin from using races with bigger fields which might be more popular with bettors and generate significantly more handle. He predicted the change would cut the drop in handle from 18% to 13%.

 

Commissioner Kathy Byrne moved unsuccessfully to table the rules change, arguing the board was not given notice that emergency action was proposed and that no actual emergency exists.

 

"You projected this situation last fall" in the dates hearing, she said to Petrillo. Her motion failed, 4-7, and the rules change then passed, 6-5.

 

Block tried to explain to the board that the change means horsemen now face much less certainty that any given race in the condition book will actually go--or that substitute races will cater to the same categories of horses as the races they replace.

 

"I'm going to have to do a lot of explaining with every breeder, every owner, and every trainer and it's not going to go over very well," he said.

 

IRB chairman Jeffrey Brincat warned the disputants as the meeting adjourned: "We're all in the same lifeboat."