Slots in Maryland and What They Mean for Horse Racing

The voters of Anne Arundel County have spoken.

In the November 2nd elections, citizens of Anne Arundel County voted in favor of Question A.

Question A was a referendum that would have made it possible for developers to build a slots emporium at Arundel Mills mall. Question A passed by a 12 percent margin, with 56 percent of voters being for it as opposed to the vocal 44 percent that was against it.

Plans to begin constructing the newest site for slots in Maryland have been moving forward since the end of the election, but those plans, and the victory that gave way to them, didn’t pass without causing some collateral damage.

While the passing of Question A was a big victory for David Cordish, chairman of development company that will be constructing the billion dollar entertainment complex, his plans have put struck a huge blow to the state of Maryland’s long standing horse racing industry.

Opposition to Arundel Mills slots was largely backed by The Maryland Jockey Club. The Maryland Jockey Club had hoped that, by killing Cordish’s plans for slots at Arundel Mills, they could open the premier facility for slots in Maryland at their own long troubled Laurel Park Race Course.

With plans for Anne Arundel slots moving forward, Jockey Club president Tom Chuckas said that his organization plans to downsize racing operations at the facility in neighboring Laurel. With the intention of eliminating live racing from Laurel all together and turn it into an off-track betting (OTB ) facility, Chuckas stated that he also intends to close the jockey club’s training facility in Bowie and run a 40-day long meet around the Preakness at the Pimlico Race Course in Baltimore, as opposed to the normal.

Frank Stornach, chairman of MI Developments and owner of the race track at Laurel Park, has other plans. MI Developments (MID), is the majority shareholder of the Maryland Jockey Club and Stornach himself isn’t quite so pessimistic in the face of new facilities for slots in Maryland.

Stornach, having recently taken on the role of chief executive officer for MID in place of former CEO Dennis Mills, states that he plans for both Pimlico and Laurel to continue as they always have throughout 2011.

This comes as a surprise to Penn National Gaming, the Jockey Club minority owner who had expressed support in Chuckas’s earlier claim that the organization would cut back on racing in order to stay financially viable.

The two organizations, Penn National Gaming and MI Developments, plan to meet with each other over the coming weeks to discuss the future of the beleaguered race tracks and what the coming of slots in Maryland will ultimately mean for the state’s longstanding horse racing industry in general.

Despite what the future would hold and Stornach’s efforts to keep tradition alive at Pimlico and Laurel, he has confirmed that the training facility at Bowie will indeed be closing.

When asked about whether he would consider slots at the racing facilities in order to help the ailing industry, Storanch went on the record of saying that he believes the horse racing industry needs to succeed on its own and that on site slots would not be of any help in the long run.

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