March 13, 2014--United Florida
Horsemen, a consortium of nearly 7,000 Florida Quarter Horse and Thoroughbred
racehorse owners and trainers said about this morning’s Florida House Gaming
Committee meeting:
“We look forward to continuing to educate our lawmakers on the
billion-dollar economic impact of Florida’s internationally known horse racing
industry. We urge our legislators to seek the proper information on
why decoupling would put our horsemen out of business—and their thousands of
employees out of work.
If Florida is truly open for business, we must focus on
fostering the thousands of existing horse racing small businesses that are
already here--as well as those looking to come to Florida--by ensuring that our
full schedules of racing days remain intact. This will promote the same
investment and very economic impact that lawmakers are earnestly trying to
create.
A brochure on the Florida horse racing industry's economic
impact is attached.
For a video replay and meeting materials on this morning's
meeting, click here: http://www.myfloridahouse.com/Sections/Committees/committeesdetail.aspx?TermId=85&CommitteeId=2776
In Iowa and Florida, there are attempts to decouple casinos from the racetracks. While Iowa may be a unique enough situation that it may not have a national impact, should decoupling happen in Florida, expect the precedent to be set and watch other states attempt similar legislative changes.
On top of that, in West Virginia there is a proposal to change the mandatory commission paid to the racing industry to an annual appropriation in the budget where the legislature decides how much racing gets every year, if anything at all (look at New Jersey).
I expect racing interests to fight the good battle but racing's strategy can't be just slot revenue; it needs other strategies to keep the industry going. Failure to have multiple strategies leaves racing a sitting duck.
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