Back to the races with quick legislation fix
Lawmakers rescued Massachusetts horse racing from a crisis of their own making by quickly reauthorizing live and simulcast events that were banned in the state, in all, for about 36 hours.
The House and Senate worked quickly yesterday morning in their first informal sessions since the close of the formal lawmaking season by enacting the emergency legislation and sending it to Gov. Charlie Baker, who briskly signed it into law.
Suffolk Downs operations chief Chip Tuttle, who sent simulcast workers home Wednesday and feared having to cancel two days of live racing this weekend, applauded the quick fix.
“We want to thank the House, Senate and Governor for addressing this today and we’re looking forward to two great days of racing this weekend,” Tuttle said in a statement.
Suffolk Downs was expecting hundreds of horses to come and thousands of spectators to witness one of its four live racing weekends of the year. The track is requesting regulators approve a fifth weekend for September.
The relatively routine reauthorization bill extending the permissions for live and simulcast racing in Massachusetts seemed to be on track Tuesday, but the bill’s progress was halted in the chaos of the final hours of the session — as major complex legislation held up until the last day ate up legislators’ focus.
In fact, the bill was passed by the House and Senate but lacked an approval from the Senate to take immediate effect and the final sign-off to enact the bill from both the House and the Senate.
When the authorization lapsed Wednesday, gaming officials sent letters to Suffolk Downs, Plainridge Park Casino and Raynham Park warning them to stop horse racing operations until the issue was fixed.
Meeting yesterday in Springfield, the Massachusetts Gaming Commission said it approved a request from Plainridge to move races scheduled for yesterday to today with the hope a reauthorization would be passed by then. Even then, gaming officials seemed to lack a sense for whether a fix was certain.
“We are in a bit of a waitand-see mode,” said commission executive director Ed Bedrosian.
He warned the commissioners of the hundreds of jobs on the line and risks involved with horse racing being kept on ice too long.
“The longer racing and simulcasting is not operational, the greater risk of us losing our seasonal employees who are well trained and experienced in their jobs,” Bedrosian said. “I’d hate for us to lose a regulatory capacity if this lapse goes on too long.”
Minutes after the comments made at the top of regulators’ 12:30 p.m. meeting, both legislative bodies — meeting informally with a handful of lawmakers — approved the bill. Baker signed the measure and it took effect immediately at 1:31 p.m.