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The same thing that made 1'st racing mostly irrelevant in MD is doing the same to them in California. 1st racing's opinion that revenue from outside gambling (slots revenue) wouldn't help racing. When they bought the tracks in MD they gave the previous owner Joe Defrancis Jr. the rights to all slots revenue at the tracks. The problem with that is the MD legislature wanted to put outside gambling at the tracks to help the owner redevelop the tracks. Eventually MD built casinos at other locations and diverted some of the revenue to the state racing purse account to enlarge purses. Either 1st racing's short sited opinion of outside gambling money wasn't good for racing, or the Defrancis family getting some of that money, prevented the state from giving control of that money to 1st racing. The breeders and horse owners put together a nonprofit and were given control of the state's racing purse account. lol 1st Racing would come to the non profit every year with their hands out to help pay for the overhead of operating the tracks. The non profit has had control of racing for years. lol It was finally put in writing with the recent agreement giving the non profit control of Pimlico.
Without help from outside gambling to pay for racing in California, the tracks will suffer a slow death. Thankfully Breeders and Horse owners avoided that outcome in MD by taking control of racing through the back door lol.
Last edited by bisket; 03-20-2024 at 11:34 AM.
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