Post time: Illinois Racing Board grants Arlington race dates despite passing on casino bid

Embittered state horse racing regulators approved a license Tuesday for Arlington International Racecourse, begrudgingly handing down 2020 race dates to the 91-year-old track as its corporate owner asked for “patience” in the wake of its controversial decision not to pursue a newly authorized casino license it had sought for decades.

A week after the Illinois Racing Board implied it could withhold Arlington’s license in response to owner Churchill Downs Inc. turning down the “racino” option long viewed as a financial savior for the struggling industry, the nine-member panel voted unanimously to grant its 68 live racing dates next year “for the good of racing in Illinois,” board chairman Jeffrey Brincat said.

But the historic track’s future remains uncertain beyond next year.

Churchill Downs general counsel Brad Blackwell insisted to board members that the gambling giant wasn’t threatening to shut down Arlington or move the track after 2021 due to burdensome taxes under the state’s new gambling law.

The press release making their bombshell announcement last month certainly seemed to suggest otherwise. The Louisville-based company said the racino tax structure made the investment “untenable”, and said it would consider “moving the racing license to another community in the Chicagoland area or elsewhere in the state” — without committing to live racing beyond 2021.

Mitchell Armentrout/Sun-Times

That’s despite the fact Churchill had lobbied for years in Springfield for exactly such a license, along with other Illinois horse racing interests who have viewed casino gambling revenue as a financial lifeline for decimated horse racing purses.

“We’re still trying to figure this out,” Blackwell told board members Tuesday. “We don’t have all the answers now, but we’re committed to finding them. We would appreciate your patience as we do so.”

Nor would Blackwell comment on speculation from Racing Board commissioner Thomas McCauley that Churchill Downs was simply seeking leverage for negotiating a more favorable tax structure in Springfield, or protecting its other major Illinois gambling asset: Rivers Casino in Des Plaines, its property just 11 miles away from Arlington. Churchill Downs is also vying to open the newly authorized Waukegan casino.

Mitchell Armentrout/Sun-Times

McCauley — who moved last week for the Racing Board to delay voting on 2020 race dates to give Churchill a week to consider whether it “wants to signal to the world at once and for all it’s only a gaming software company, and no longer a horse racing enterprise” — subjected Arlington president Tony Petrillo and Blackwell to another half-hour of pointed questions on their corporate strategy. Blackwell said he couldn’t discuss most of that without “breaching confidence in management meetings.”

In the end, McCauley joined other board members in granting Arlington’s dates, saying “at this point there would be so much disruption with respect to workers’ lives if this schedule materially changed, that I’m gonna vote yes.”

Brincat said the board still eventually wants Arlington to pursue the 1,200 allowable slots and table games at the northwest suburban track, saying “we would like to see this continuously develop.”

That wasn’t good enough for Michael Campbell, president of the Illinois Thoroughbred Horsemen’s Association, who said he was “deeply disappointed” to see the board “kick the can down the road.

Mitchell Armentrout/Sun-Times

“Churchill Downs was not held accountable,” Campbell said. “They have an obligation to racing. The genesis of their company was racing. It’s just wrong at every level.”

The corporation instead has said it will invest in a sports-betting license once the Illinois Gaming Board finalizes the application process.

Petrillo applauded the state’s other two existing racetracks, Hawthorne Race Course in Stickney and downstate Fairmount Park, for applying to become racinos, and even saying “we may be a bit jealous.

Mitchell Armentrout/Sun-Times

“However, we at Arlington understand that each of our companies are different. We have different needs. We each operate under our own unique circumstances. And that no one — no one — wants to make a decision that will lead to failure.”

Longtime Arlington owner Richard Duchossois, who sold the controlling interest in the track to Churchill in 2000 after years of lobbying for casino games at racetracks, said after Tuesday’s meeting: “I have 100% confidence in Churchill’s management.”

Hawthorne and Fairmount received their race dates Tuesday as well, along with a new racino proposed for Tinley Park by Hawthorne general manager Tim Carey and video gambling developer Rick Heidner.