State regulators gathered at the annual Racing and Gaming Conference at Saratoga Aug. 16 to reflect on how the implementation of the Horseracing Integrity and Safety Authority has – or hasn't – gone in their respective jurisdictions.
Members of a three-person panel at the conference's second day had varying perspectives, depending on the status of HISA in their locations. The speakers had slightly differing views on whether they welcomed the organization, but all cited concerns about the expense of the regulation.
Dan Hartman, former director of the Colorado Division of Gaming, noted that Colorado had entered into a voluntary agreement with the Authority and the adjustment process had been rough. Like many states, Colorado runs both Thoroughbred and Quarter Horse races, and non-Thoroughbreds aren't automatically subject to HISA. Hartman pointed out that this means the Colorado racing commission needs to maintain its full structure to deal with non-Thoroughbreds while paying for regulation of Thoroughbreds by HISA.
Colorado runs a 39-day meet in the summers at Arapahoe Park and Hartman said in the first part of its 2023 meet using the Horseracing Integrity and Welfare Unit for its drug testing, the state encountered longer turnaround times for testing results. Before, he said purses could be released in four to five days since test results came straight to the commission, but now HIWU receives the results first and at the start of the meet it took as much as three weeks for a purse to be released.
“A lot of racing around the country is small racetracks and folks who live week to week,” said Hartman.
Hartman also said HISA requires covered racetracks to have full-time regulatory veterinarians and stewards, which is not typical for Arapahoe, whose officials leave at the end of the meet for other seasonal meets.
Julie Brown, commissioner at the Florida Gaming Control Commission, said racing regulation in the state was restructured in summer 2021 under her organization, which gave it more law enforcement power than it had before. Then, in summer 2022, the state became subject to HISA's safety regulation.
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“We have been vigorously regulating for decades,” said Brown of the previous state system in Florida. “We did not like it. None of us were happy about this mandate. Our tracks were being assessed these exorbitant fees.”
Brown said the primary reason Florida entered into an agreement with HISA was that its racing industry couldn't afford to lose the revenue from interstate wagering. She had been curious how much disclosure states could expect from HISA and said she has been pleasantly surprised so far, but echoed Hartman's assessment that implementation of the national authority has been bumpy.
“One of our attorneys says, 'It's like they're continuing to build the plane as it flies,' and I think that's a great way to say it,” Brown said.
Florida racetracks were handed some of the highest bills for the cost of the program, and Brown said these were addressed by a tax bill that allows Tampa Bay Downs and Gulfstream Park to offset the costs.
The third panelist was Brett Bonin, assistant attorney general at the Louisiana Department of Justice, who took his time on the panel to campaign for the legal challenge his state has led against HISA. The primary objection for the state's horsemen was the expense, which prompted them to call his office in droves, he said.
“For Louisiana, [HISA] would be an absolute worst-case scenario,” he said. “This would be absolutely devastating.
“Our attorney general believes he's fighting for the life of horse racing in Louisiana and the rest of the country.”
As has been detailed at length, HISA's cost assessments to racetracks is based on a formula that takes into account both the number of races held at the facility as well as the average purse level there. Bonin believes the assessment unfairly punishes Louisiana tracks for having year-round racing, despite HISA's assertions that the formula is aimed at balancing the costs of frequent racing with the financial resources of better-funded states.
Bonin also said he thinks the existing state system has its advantages over HISA. For one thing, he and panel moderator Peter Sacopulos cite concerns that the adjudication process for medication violations under HISA is considerably more costly to covered persons, which means fewer of them will be able to afford to hire attorneys to help them through the process.
Sacopulos is an attorney whose practice relies in part on defending licensees in cases before the state racing commission.
Further, Bonin believes HISA doesn't give enough credit to the expertise of existing state regulators (though it has hired a number of them).
“Horse racing has a soul and the at soul is industry members who have decades of experience at every level,” he said. “While the horse racing industry has a Hall of Fame down the street for horses and trainers and jockeys there's no category for regulators and there really should be, because it's the regulators with all their experience who for decades have quietly been shepherding racing and providing the continuity and the things that help the industry survive.”
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