Group Opposes Format of Suffolk Race Plan
Blood-Horse
Representatives of a group of vociferous and angry New England Thoroughbred racing stakeholders showed up in force at a Massachusetts Gaming Commission hearing June 11 to voice their strong opposition to the supplemental application of Suffolk Downs to conduct three days of live racing in 2015.
Bill Lagorio, who has been a trainer for three decades, was the main spokesman for the group, which he said was comprised of 123 local horsemen, breeders, veterinarians, blacksmiths, and other vendors.
“We depend upon a significant live racing meet to make our living. The short meeting provides no short-term or long-term benefits for the local horsemen, the (Massachusetts) breeding program, or the local businesses, or vendors,” Lagorio said. “Utilizing the Race Horse Development Fund, which is meant for purses, should be for a meaningful race meet which would benefit us. The main beneficiary of a three-day event would be Suffolk Downs, the very entity that announced last October that they would no longer be in the racing business.”
As a consequence of Suffolk’s gaming partner, Mohegan Sun, failing to be awarded the single Boston-area casino license by the MGC in September, the 80-year-old racetrack’s ownership group declared that the 2014 meet would be its last.
Over the ensuing months, the board of the New England chapter of the Horsemen’s Benevolent and Protective Association and track management worked to devise a viable plan to keep live racing alive in the region, despite a limited supply of funds and race-ready horses, which many of the horsemen moved to other East Coast tracks.
Suffolk Downs chief operating officer Chip Tuttle and the NEHBPA felt that a three-day meet, with live racing held one Saturday in the months of July, August, and September was the best option.
Nonetheless, some from the group of disgruntled horsemen testified that Frank Stronach or other investors would be interested in taking over Suffolk Downs.
“I thought I represented all of the horsemen and I really feel for those who don’t think I do,” NEHBPA president Anthony Spadea told the gaming commissioners when it was his turn to speak at the 90-minute session. “I’ve talked to Frank Stronach and many other,s and have spent day and night trying my best to have a meet. We did what we had to do.”
Spadea added that the abbreviated meet for 2015 would allow Thoroughbred breeding and racing to continue in the short term, while a long-term solution, which includes the construction of a new racetrack elsewhere in the state, owned and operated by the horsemen, is secured.
After listening to impassioned and often emotional testimony from both supporters, including Dr. Anthony Zizza representing the Massachusetts Thoroughbred Breeders Association and opponents of Suffolk’s application, the MGC took no definitive action.
Instead, commissioner Gayle Cameron, who ran the hearing, said after that the five-member panel will consider all of the testimony offered at the meeting, and have its legal department and director of racing complete due diligence and issue recommendations before rendering a decision on the application.
