Dozens of industry leaders met in Saratoga Springs on Tuesday for the annual Saratoga Institute on Racing and Gaming Law, and discussions regarding the structure of New York's Off Track Betting produced a call for change
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“The whole structure of Off Track Betting is ass-backwards, it’s upside down,” said Joseph Faraldo, head of the Standardbred Owners Association of New York, in an article on The Troy Record. “They should go out of business. Why not let it die? If someone doesn’t have the guts to cut their throats, there should be a consolidation of OTBs.”
New York City OTB, the biggest of six regional Off Track Betting corporations has a $46 million debt that’s grown $8 million since the state took it over in June 2008.
Faraldo said New York should adopt the Illinois model in which a consortium of racetracks runs the state’s OTBs.
“Without six corporations there would be more efficiency and more efficiency means more income,” said Faraldo. “We’d probably all end up with more money.”
According to the Troy Record, Sandy Frucher, the newly named New York City OTB Chairman and a former NASDAQ official, is expected to submit a report to Gov. David Paterson this month. Separately, a state Task Force on the Future of Off Track Betting is studying the issue and plans to make its recommendations to state leaders this fall.
To read the Troy Record article in its entirety, click here.
(With files from the Troy Record)
Mr. Joseph
Mr. Joseph Faraldo
Standardbred Owners Association of New York
Dear Mr. Faraldo:
You have got to be kidding me Mr. Faraldo. As the old saying goes "Say it ain't so Joe..." A statement of this nature coming from a man whose industry and homebased track has used EVERY trick in the NYS political handbook and pulled in every political favor ever owed them to enact legislation to save a sport that without the advent of video slots would be sitting on a gurney in the medical examiner's office right now with a green toe tag attached. How dare you assail the OTB's Joe, particularly NYCOTB when it is your very own base of operations Yonkers Raceway that is helping to bleed NYCOTB to death.
Why don't you address the blatant unfairness with the agreement NYCOTB made with the statewide standardbred tracks several years ago allowing NYCOTB to take action on nighttime thoroughbred racing from around the country provided the harness tracks get a piece of the pie? NYCOTB was STUPID to get into an agreement such as that one because it was not the saving grace they thought it would be and by all rights why should your industry get a penny from anything NYCOTB does to better their plight? Yonkers cried like babies in diapers how if NYCOTB were allowed to take betting on nighttime thoroughbred racing instead of strictly on NYS harness races we in the harness industry will be badly hurt if not killed off entirely, so therefore we deserve a slice of the NYCOTB nighttime action. Well I will be the one with the guts to stand up to you thugs at Yonkers and tell you the racino at Empire State CLEARLY has effected NYCOTB's profitability and I think they deserve a piece of the profits from the Yonkers slots. I don't see Yonkers agreeing to that line of thinking anytime soon do you? Furthermore when NYCOTB entered into this silly agreement to give the harness tracks a slice of their daily betting handle for "permission" to take nighttime thoroughbred action, Monticello was a DAYTIME ONLY operation and nothing NYCOTB did with their evening program effected Monticello in anyway BECAUSE THEY WERE NOT OPEN AT NIGHT yet they also managed to get a piece of the nighttime thoroughbred action pie...why Joe? Can you also explain to me why Yonkers demanded to continue to get a daily piece of NYCOTB's nighttime thoroughbred handle for the nearly two years Yonkers was completely closed for renovations? How did ANYTHING NYCOTB did with their nighttime program impact Yonkers when Yonkers was completely closed for renovations? Wasn't the original complaint by Yonkers regarding NYCOTB taking nighttime thoroughbred action that it would impact Yonkers attendance and daily handle? If your closed for renovations and you have nothing but construction people working at the track how does anything NYCOTB do impact Yonkers attendance and handle? Answer these questions for me Mr Faraldo.
Your sport if left without slot monies is a dead piece. Twenty five years ago my Dad had to tie a handkerchief to the car antenna in the Yonkers parking lot so we could find the car on a Saturday night after racing was over. I remember it taking nearly 40 minutes to drive out of the Yonkers parking lot at the conclusion of racing years ago. You need to look at yourselves and stop blaming others for your industry's problems. Harness racing in NYS and elsewhere has a crooked feel to it and has for years. Remember Carmine Abetello being found beaten half to death in the Yonkers parking lot because he did not follow orders from the shylocks? Wasn't it the allegation that the harness industry was crooked which caused the disappearance of the "supefecta" from the New York wagering scene for nearly 20 years before it's relatively recent return? Your industry is no different then any other politically influenced entity. You have your closet full of grimy politicians ready and willing to save your sorry behinds and so does OTB. Cast the first stone Mr. Faraldo only when you are without sin....and your sport, especially Yonkers Raceway is far from being pure. "
I invite Mr. Faraldo or his representative to respond to this letter either directly to me at [email protected] or on this page. I am sure he will do neither.