As previously relayed, a bicameral bill has been introduced in New York that would strip that state’s racing industry of most of its quarter-billion-dollar annual subsidy. And now the war (of words) is on. Because the racing people can’t rationally…
The battle lines have been drawn in Oregon, where Grants Pass owner (and billionaire coffee mogul) Travis Boersma seeks to install 225 “Historical Racing Machines” (HRMs) at the “Flying Lark,” a resort that’s to be attached to the racetrack. The…
Last month, I posted about our victory in stopping a proposed track in Sturbridge, Mass. But with millions in state gifts still available, the racing people are sure to keep trying. Hence the need for continued vigilance. This is why…
The “racino” – combination racetrack/casino – is a win-win for the racing people: Not only are purses jacked up by slots revenue, but the tracks – flush with that unearned income – are able to pay first through last. So,…
As I’ve previously written, the massive subsidization (corporate welfare) of the U.S. horseracing industry constitutes a triple wrong: it’s an affront to our free-market system; it cheats schoolchildren out of millions of desperately-needed education dollars; and most important to us…
It looks as though harness racing in Florida is soon to be dead. A bill that will decouple – free the track owner from having to hold and subsidize horse races – Pompano Park has now passed the legislature and…
I’ll give Travis Boersma this: The coffee tycoon and new (2019) operator of Grants Pass, the only commercial racetrack left in Oregon, is, if nothing else, a great salesman. Ahead of this past Monday’s meet opening, Boersma told the Paulick…
No matter how the racing industry tries to dress them up, “Instant Racing Machines” – aka “Historical Racing Machines” – at racetracks are, in both purpose and result, the exact same thing as slot machines at those tracks – there…
The Philadelphia Inquirer, which has twice before decried the corporate welfare flowing to that state’s moribund horseracing industry, took aim again yesterday – this time focusing more on the cruelty and death. In the article, “Betting on horses’ lives,” journalist…
Once again, Governor Wolf of Pennsylvania has submitted a budget that would strip some $200 million in annual corporate welfare from that state’s horseracing industry and redirect it where it belongs: education. (Last year, the governor proposed the same, but…
The thing about the hundreds of millions of dollars in corporate welfare flowing to horseracing every year is this: the industry doesn’t even try to hide it. Poll a racing exec in any of the subsidy states – which is…
As we have repeatedly pointed out, the bulk of U.S. Racing only still exists because of corporate welfare; if this slots spigot were shut off, over half the tracks in this country would be shuttered, virtually overnight. In short, the…
