Ellis Park will close by summer, owner says.

FRANKFORT — An owner of one of Kentucky’s leading race tracks told a legislative panel Thursday that if something isn’t done soon to increase prize money at Kentucky tracks, the storied Ellis Park track will be out of business by summer.

Ron Geary, owner of Ellis Park, told the House budget committee Thursday that the Henderson track can no longer compete with tracks in Indiana and other states which have higher purses beefed up by proceeds from expanded gambling.

“Without alternative gaming at Kentucky race tracks, Ellis Park’s 88th consecutive racing season in the summer2009 will have to be our final one,” Geary said. And other tracks in Kentucky will likely follow, Geary said.

Geary said Thursday that he will likely have to cut back the number of racing days at Ellis Park’s meet this summer because too few horses are coming to the park to race.

In 2009, Ellis Park’s purses will be about $4.5 million while Hoosier Park in Anderson, Ind., which has expanded gambling, will have a purses in excess of $15 million, Geary noted.

Geary’s comments came as the House budget committee heard testimony Thursday on a proposal pushed by House Speaker Greg Stumbo, D-Prestonsburg, that would allow electronic slot machines at Kentucky race tracks.

House Appropriations and Revenue Chairman Rick Rand, D-Bedford, said Thursday that the committee wanted to hear testimony on H.B. 158 as the state’s braces for another budget shortfall in 2009.

According to testimony provided by an industry expert, expanded gambling could generate as much as $330 million a year in tax revenue. Revenues from the expanded gambling would also augment prize money at race tracks.

Stumbo told the House committee that the current proposal also allows for a reduction in property taxes on cars and boats. Money generated from the slots would be used to replace those tax dollars, Stumbo said.

Some of the money generated from the slot machines would go to expanding drug treatment programs and allow more money to go back to the counties, Stumbo said.

“There are a lot of public policy questions that will be asked on this,” Stumbo said. The current proposal was only a starting point, he added.

After the hearing, Stumbo said he thought that more people were interested in at least looking at expanded gambling as part of the solution to the state’s fiscal woes, even in the Republican-controlled Senate.

But there is still much opposition to the expansion from the religious right and some legislators, said Nancy Jo Kemper, of the Kentucky Council of Churches.

Kemper said that there are still questions on how much money expanded gaming would generate for Kentucky. Moreover, there have been no unbiased studies presented to the legislature on the effects of expanded gambling on other businesses, Kemper said.

– Beth Musgrave

Filed Under: Featured • Greg Stumbo • KY General Assembly