Assemblyman Ronald S. Dancer’s bipartisan plan to increase the number of standardbred horses in New Jersey was approved today by the Assembly Regulatory Oversight and Gaming Committee.
“It wasn’t that long ago that New Jersey’s equine economy was fueled by dozens of stallions and thousands of mares, yet today there are just three stallions, and a few hundred mares, left in the Garden State,” Dancer, R-Ocean, Burlington, Monmouth and Middlesex, said. “We can preserve Jersey-bred horses, farms and jobs while our horse racing industry rebounds.”
The legislation, A-4033, would expand the sire stakes program by allowing stallions from other states as long as the mare stands at a New Jersey breeding farm for at least 150 consecutive days between conception and the birth, and that the birth occurs in New Jersey.
The expansion would create a new program called the Standardbred Development Program.
“Competition from other states that have casino-style slot machines has had an impact on the New Jersey horse breeding, most notably the moving of the breeding stallions from the Perretti Farms in Upper Freehold Township to Pennsylvania,” said Dancer, whose legislative district includes Upper Freehold. “Expanding the sires stakes will help save our horse industry, which not that long ago was a $1 billion industry, providing 13,000 jobs to care for 42,000 horses on 7,200 farms across 176,000 acres of open space in New Jersey.”
The sire stakes program was established in 1971 to encourage the breeding of standardbred horses, trotters and pacers and is funded by a percentage of the bets by racing fans that provide purses for NJ horses at specially-designated races.
(Assembly Republicans)