TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) – The owners of two closed race tracks urged Kansas regulators this week to wait to revoke the facilities' operating licenses until legislators can reconsider how much slot machine revenue tracks should be allowed to keep.
"We want an opportunity to go back before the Legislature. Give us four or five months before you jerk our license," Phil Ruffin Sr., told the Kansas Racing and Gaming Commission.
The commission had planned a hearing Monday on revoking the licenses of Wichita Greyhound Park in Sedgwick County and Camptown Greyhound Park in Frontenac, both owned by Ruffin's company, and The Woodlands horse and dog tracks, owned by Howard Grace and other members of the Grace family.
Before Ruffin spoke, the commission agreed to postpone its hearing until Nov. 7, after attorneys for the track asked for the delay and after attorneys and commission members wrangled for an hour over procedural issues. Commission Chairwoman Carol Sader, of Prairie Village, said Ruffin's request would be considered at that hearing.
Lawmakers won't yet have had a chance to revisit the issue of slot machine revenues because the next legislative session doesn't begin until January.
The Woodlands closed in August after failing to reach an agreement with the Kansas Lottery to operate the slots. Wichita Greyhound Park closed last year after Sedgwick County voters rejected casino gaming. Camptown has been closed since 2000 and negotiations with the Lottery ended in a stalemate.
The law requires the tracks to have 150 days of racing throughout the year to keep their licenses.
The track owners contend they need slot machines to be profitable. A 2007 law allows slots at pari-mutuel tracks, with the state owning the gambling. That law leaves no more than 40 percent of revenues from the slots for the tracks, and owners contend that's not enough.
Ruffin wants the track to receive 58 percent of the revenues, reducing the state's take to 22 percent, the amount it receives from four state-owned casinos allowed under the same law.
Currently, 40 percent of revenues go to the state and 20 percent goes to local governments and various funds to help horses, dogs, smaller tracks and problem gamblers.
Grace, one of The Woodlands’ owners, didn't address the commission. Afterward, he said he supported Ruffin's request to give the Legislature a chance to change the law.
Others weren't sure that the Legislature would be willing to alter the law.
"Our board and most of the greyhound industry has no confidence in current track operators," said Doug Lawrence, executive director of the Kansas Greyhound Association. "We cannot pin our hopes, and our business, on a legislative fix that has little opportunity to succeed."
At the Statehouse, Senate Majority Leader Derek Schmidt stood by earlier comments that most lawmakers aren't interested in revisiting the gambling issue next year.
"Not much has changed. There's going to be plenty of budget work to be done without getting back into the gaming debate," said the Independence Republican.
