Politics Hobble Florida Racing

Most state legislators don’t know much about horse racing or care much about its problems, so the sport frequently suffers at the hands of politicians. Over the years, one state has outdone all others in making a mess of its racing industry: Florida. And now Florida has outdone itself with its latest act of irresponsibility.

All of the state’s laws pertaining to parimutuel wagering have been wiped off the books, and it is now uncertain whether any horse track, dog track or jai-alai fronton may operate legally. If they do operate, the state seemingly has no authority to regulate them--to punish race-fixing or the drugging of horses, for example. A state official told the Miami Herald that “John Gotti (the convicted Mafia boss) should come down and own a racetrack here.”

There might be a temptation for outsiders to laugh at this preposterous situation and say Florida’s politicians and track owners deserve the fiasco they have created for themselves. But Florida’s problems touch the whole American racing industry, because the Breeders’ Cup is scheduled for Oct. 31 at Gulfstream Park. Officers of the Breeders’ Cup are so worried that they have announced they will start looking for an alternate site if they aren’t assured that Gulfstream will be allowed to operate.

One year ago the Florida legislature passed “sunset legislation” affecting all state laws affecting parimutuel wagering; they would lapse June 30, 1992, unless the legislature specifically extended them. Boilerplate legal language attached to any 1992 racing bill would have kept the old laws in effect.

This year’s legislative session included the usual wrangling over racing dates that has blighted Florida racing for decades. Gulfstream Park and Hialeah have waged endless war over the prime midwinter dates; these battles are resolved not by any spirit of compromise or sense of fairness but by the political strength of each side.

Thus, all of the Florida tracks, plus the dog industry and the jai-alai industry, enlist legislators to promote their causes. The politicians benefit from the ongoing conflict; some cynics suggest that the sunset legislation was passed to give legislators even more leverage in obtaining campaign contributions this year. But the clash of so many narrow interests frequently produces gridlock or paralysis--and that is what happened in Tallahassee when the annual fray was joined by yet another special interest: the advocates of video slot machines.

To all of the various racing bills that were introduced to favor one track or another, House Speaker T.K. Wetherell attached a provision that would allow video slot machines to be installed at racetracks. Gov. Lawton Chiles declared he would veto any bill legalizing the slot machines, but Wetherell was undeterred.

In the waning days of the legislative session, the tracks finally agreed on the basis for a 1993 schedule: they would smooth over their differences by letting the citizens of Florida give them money.

Hialeah would graciously accept the less-desirable months of the racing schedule in exchange for healthy tax concessions from a beleaguered state government; Calder and Gulfstream got smaller concessions. Some legislators objected to these giveaways, but the weary members of the Senate passed the bill 33-0, and the House was expected to pass it too. But Wetherell was still determined to have his video slot machines; if he couldn’t, the racing bill wouldn’t get to the floor. And so the measure died as the legislature adjourned for 1992, and the sun set on all parimutuel legislation in Florida.

Could racetracks continue to operate as of July 1? The state’s Department of Business Regulation had previously issued an opinion that “parimutuel wagering would be illegal if existing statutes were allowed to sunset.” So the tracks went to court in Tallahassee asking for an injunction, and the court granted them the right to stay open temporarily. Its ruling on the issue is expected in August. If the court concludes that parimutuel wagering is illegal, Chiles would have little choice but to summon a special session of the legislature, which is not scheduled to reconvene until early 1993.

But as each day of this drama has passed, officials of the Breeders’ Cup have become more worried. The world’s richest day of racing requires months of planning. “We’re caught between a rock and a hard place,” Breeders’ Cup executive director D.G. Van Clief said this week, “and every day that space gets narrower.”

Breeders’ Cup executives want to be assured by Aug. 1 that their event can be held at Gulfstream. The track’s frustrated officials believe that Chiles could reasonably and legally offer this assurance.