Real Estate & Property Law

Maryland Horse Racing on Brink of Eminent Domain

By Alan Ackerman

 The State is about to condemn the horse tracks if the horse tracks will not run during the coming season.

Underlying this problem is the reality that horse racing simply cannot compete on an equal footing with the gambling casinos unless they have substantial help in the form of non-racing revenue, government funding or a way to find new clientele to replace the aging Damon Runyons of the world. Horse racing is simply a problem everywhere, and as long as the casinos want to control the situation, we can expect that race tracks and the substantial employment that they create are about to be thrown out of the window.

The Capital

The result was designed to keep horse racing alive no matter what private owners decide: the power to exercise eminent domain over Laurel Park, Pimlico, the Bowie Race Course Training Center, and all rights and events associated with the lucrative Preakness Stakes, the middle jewel of the Triple Crown.

"We want to make sure we do everything in our power …… to make sure that our state has the maximum amount of flexibility to protect the state's best interests," O'Malley said at the time. "It wouldn't be responsible for us to presume that there will be a private-market solution to this."

Horse racing is now at another pivotal juncture after the Maryland Racing Commission decided last week to reject a shortened racing schedule and joint operation deal for those same tracks.

The Maryland Jockey Club and its co-owners, MI Developments and Penn National Gaming, proposed just 17 live racing days at Laurel in January and 30 live racing days built around the Preakness at Pimlico in May. Company representatives described it as a stop-gap measure to try to figure out a better path for the second half of 2011.

Full post as published by National Eminent Domain Blog on December 09, 2010 (boomark / email).