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Future grim for horse farms
Betting at Ohio tracks has slipped in the past 5 years
Sunday, November 18, 2007
XENIA TWP. — Two years ago, Golden Glen Farm was home to 32 thoroughbred race horses. Today, the 157-acre farm has just 13 horses and its financial hopes ride on a promising yearling bay stud named Cowboy, who will begin racing next March.
"I'd love to keep this as a horse farm," said Tom McCann, co-owner of Golden Glen with his wife, Judy. "But I'm afraid I'll be joining the growing list of people who have shut their farms down."
Thoroughbred mares run in open fields at the Golden Glen Horse Farm near Yellow Springs. Ohio horse racing is seeing a decline in horse track betting affecting farms along with state programs.The future for Ohio's horse farms looks grim, and breeders and owners say Ohioans' aversion to legal gambling is partly responsible. When voters said no to slot machines at racetracks in 2006, they also said no to millions of dollars in state revenues and no to Ohio's increasingly hard-pressed horse farms, industry advocates say.
With competing states like Indiana, Pennsylvania and West Virginia offering other forms of gambling at their racetracks, total betting at Ohio tracks slipped more than 30 percent from 2001 to 2006, from $620 million to $430 million. That has meant smaller revenues for the state, including a $1.7 million drop in support for Ohio's Passport program of in-home care for seniors.
It also has meant smaller purses for winning horses and their breeders in Ohio, many of whom are under pressure to scale back their farms or sell them to developers. From 2001 to 2006, the number of thoroughbred race horses born in Ohio dropped by more than half, from 634 to 292, according to the Ohio Horse Breeders and Owners Association.
Horse breeders say more is at stake than their livelihoods. Their farms create tens of thousands of jobs and help preserve Ohio's dwindling green space. "All of this affects the economy of Ohio," said Gayle Babst, president of the Ohio Horse Breeders and Owners Association.
But opponents of slot machines and casinos say more gambling is not the answer to reviving Ohio's horse industry. "The casino industry just wants to use them to get casinos," said Rob Walgate of the Ohio Roundtable.
Contact this reporter at (937) 225-2437 or
jdebrosse@DaytonDailyNews.com.
