Lack of Seating Presents Hurdle for Austintown Track
YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio – Penn National Gaming Inc. will address issues being raised over the horse-racing portion of the proposed Hollywood Slots at Mahoning Valley Race Course in Austintown at next week’s meeting of the Ohio State Racing Commission. Those issues include the low number of seats -- 395 -- that would be available for patrons to watch live racing at the new thoroughbred track in comparison to the track it is replacing, and whether a sufficient number of horse stalls will be built.
As the racing commission prepares to consider Penn National’s application to transfer to Austintown the thoroughbred license there from its Beulah Park track outside Columbus, contractors are doing site work for the proposed site of the race track and video lottery terminal facility, which Penn National plans to build on the former Centerpointe Business Park off Route 46.
Bob Tenenbaum, a Penn National spokesman, said company representatives plan to be present at the commission’s next meeting, March 12, to argue their case for the license transfer.
The transfer faces a potential stumbling block over the number of grandstand and other seats that would be available to racing fans. According to racing commission documents, Penn National has proposed a total of 395 seats for racing fans at the Austintown site, including a 220-seat grandstand. The Beulah Park track has just over 4,700 total seats, including 3,700-seat grandstand.
“That’s a primary issue that has to be resolved” before the license transfer is approved, said Robert Schmitz, chairman of the Ohio State Racing Commission. Schmitz says he's “very much concerned” with the seating issue and that opening a new track with fewer than 400 seats “doesn’t make a lot of sense to us on the racing commission.”
By comparison, the Canfield Fairgrounds, which hosts harness racing during the annual Canfield Fair, has seating for more than 5,000 patrons, according to its website.
“That’s exactly our point,” remarked Schmitz. “We want to move horseracing forward in Ohio and we think [a 220-seat grandstand] is not a step forward. That will be an issue as we move through this process. We understand the importance of the video lottery terminals but the horses are the ones that bring people to the dance and we’d like to have more seats for folks to watch live racing.”
For Penn National, which is expected to spend around $150 million to build the racino, to plan seating to accommodate a few hundred race fans “is just stunning,” said Mark Munroe, who was appointed to the racing commission in late 2011.
A similar issue was raised at the commission’s January meeting concerning the Miami Valley Gaming & Racing harness track in Warren County, which has a proposed 700-seat grandstand. At that meeting, Munroe, who is chairman of the Mahoning County Republican Party, remarked that most county fairs in Ohio have grandstands that are much larger than what was being proposed.
The racing commission “has serious concerns about these facility plans,” Munroe said of the Austintown racino.
“We anticipate that [the seating issue] will be raised by the commission and we’re prepared to respond to it,” said Penn National’s Tenenbaum. "Because we’re sure that this is going to be raised,” he said the company would wait until the March 12 meeting “to respond directly” to the commission’s members.
Penn National’s plans call for opening the new track during the second quarter of 2014 and that schedule is “still on track,” Tenenbaum said. When structural steel begins going up depends on when the state racing commission approves the license transfer, he said.
Another concern being raised is stabling and dorming at the Mahoning Valley Race Course. According to Dave Basler, president of the Ohio Horsemen’s Benevolent and Protective Association, Penn National’s plans for Austintown call for only 500 stalls and no dormitory rooms. “That’s far short of what we have at existing facilities,” he said. By comparison, Beulah Park, the track where the Mahoning Valley license would be transferred from, has 1,200 stalls and 140 dorm rooms.
“Our position has always been that, as part of a $150 million improvement project, horsemen shouldn’t have lesser facilities than we have at the current locations,” said Basler, whose organization represents nearly 5,000 thoroughbred owners and trainers in Ohio.
Basler said his association is working with Penn National, which has provided its budget information for the barn area, to line the company up with local contractors to build stalls at a “more reasonable price” than had been quoted, and to close the gap between what Penn National Wants and what the horsemen’s association wants.
The commission hasn’t approved the transfer of the thoroughbred license to Austintown from Beulah Park “and we’re certainly interested in seeing that everythingis done to make this transfer as beneficial as possible to all parties,” Munroe said. But first, the commission will be looking at Penn National’s plans for Austintown and whether they are “adequate to meet the needs of the racing side,” he said.
The commission is grateful that gaming companies are “going to breathe new life into both thoroughbred and harness racing in Ohio, which have seen steady declines over the last 15 to 20 years," Munroe added. "But at the same time, this is our only opportunity to get this right. The commission in particular has an obligation to see the interests of the thoroughbred and harness racing community are protected with these new facilities and we think that these facility plans are inadequate.”
Copyright 2013 The Business Journal, Youngstown, Ohio.
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