TRENTON — Gov. Chris Christie issued an ultimatum to New Jersey’s thoroughbred horse owners Monday, telling them they had a week to come up with a new deal in order to save horse racing in the state.
Christie blamed the owners for causing a private investor to pull out of an agreement to lease Monmouth Park racetrack.
He said a recent handshake agreement with the New Jersey Thoroughbred Horsemen’s Association was scuttled when lawyers for the group made new demands for $5 million in purse subsidies.
Christie said he was leaving it up to the owners to make sure horse racing remained in New Jersey.
“If they don’t come to us in the next week with a deal that works and stop extorting the taxpayers for millions of dollars in subsidies to their industry, then we’re not going to have a deal and we won’t have a horse racing industry in the state anymore,” he said.
John Forbes, president of the NJTHA, said he couldn’t immediately comment on Christie’s ultimatum. A message left for the organization’s attorney wasn’t returned.
The dispute threatens to derail the governor’s plan to privatize both Monmouth and the Meadowlands Racetrack, deals he has said have to be executed at the same time, after he decided to end state subsidies to racing more than a year ago.
Christie has been looking for a way to get the state out of horse racing. A commission he appointed recommended ending a $30 million annual subsidy to racing, which has been done.
The Meadowlands was projected to lose $11 million this year. Monmouth Park was projected to lose $6.6 million.
Final contracts to transfer the two tracks to private owners had been slated for signature on Dec. 5, at which time control of Monmouth Raceway would have gone to casino owner Morris Bailey, with Meadowlands operations going to Jeff Gural, who owns Tioga Downs and Vernon Downs in upstate New York and two horse farms.
When negotiations between the NJTHA and the administration hit a snag, Bailey pulled out of a five-year lease deal for the Oceanport track.
Tom Luchento, president of the Standardbred Breeders and Owners Association of New Jersey, said Monday that the deal with Gural to lease the Meadowlands track for Standardbred racing appeared to be moving forward and that Christie’s dispute with the thoroughbred association wouldn’t affect it.
Forbes told The Associated Press recently that his organization had been prepared to sign a deal when the administration changed its tune “at the eleventh hour.” Under the original agreement, the NJTHA would have been granted a permit to run thoroughbred races at the Meadowlands on certain dates, even though all such races had been consolidated at Monmouth.
In exchange, the NJTHA agreed to cut the racing schedule in half, to 71 days for five years. But Forbes said the administration reneged on the permit for thoroughbred racing at the Meadowlands — a permit that also would have given his group the flexibility to seek additional racing dates and potentially be used as a bargaining chip if the Meadowlands ever got slot machines or other alternative gaming.
What actually derailed the final deal hasn’t been explained by either side.
Christie on Monday accused the group of holding taxpayers hostage.
“The problem is the thoroughbred horsemen are completely untrustworthy, that’s the problem,” Christie said. “I simply am no longer going to permit millionaire horsemen to take money from waiters and waitresses and police officers and teachers who are the taxpayers of this state to fund their industry.”
Christie added that he hoped a deal could still be reached.
Associated Press writer Angela Delli Santi in Trenton contributed to this report.