McGregor says dog track industry ‘dying’

Tuesday, Nov. 28, 2000 | 3:21 a.m.

"It is no secret that we've got a dying industry unless we get some relief soon," McGregor, who owns VictoryLand in Macon County and the the Birmingham Race Course, told The Decatur Daily.

Public records show that various governmental, educational and charitable agencies in Macon and Jefferson counties have received more than $177 million from two tracks in the past 16 years.

"That is a lot of money, especially Macon County's part, and there is no way that these agencies would operate without it," said Sen. George Clay, D-Tuskegee.

"This is our Boeing and Mercedes," Clay said, comparing the track to the aerospace and automobile plants in Morgan and Tuscaloosa counties.

In addition to taxes paid to agencies in the two counties, state records show the two dog tracks, along with tracks in Mobile and Greene counties, have paid more than $50 million in state taxes since 1988. Those taxes are distributed to government agencies in all counties.

McGregor has never released other financial records from the tracks. He opened VictoryLand in 1984 and purchased the track in Birmingham in 1992 after it went bankrupt as a horse track.

A report released earlier this year by the American Greyhound Track Operators Association said audit records showed gamblers wagered $122 million in live and simulcast racing during 1998 at the Birmingham track.

At VictoryLand, people gambled a total of $85 million in live and simulcast races in 1998, according to the report.

Clay has sponsored legislation in the past two legislative sessions that would have allowed voters in the four counties with tracks to decide whether to allow video poker.

"This is an industry that needs some help because of casinos and other gambling facilities in Mississippi," Clay said. "There is no doubt in my mind that casino owners from Mississippi have spent millions of dollars fighting the video poker bills in this state."

Clay said he was unsure if he would introduce video gambling legislation in session that starts Feb. 6.

"I'm not going through what I went through the last two times," he said. "We have legislators whom we helped in getting industrial incentives passed over the past years that promised us help, but we didn't get it. All we asked for was the right of our own people to vote on the issue."