Negotiations over dates for 2020 still at impasse

Arlington and the Illinois Thoroughbred Horsemen’s Association, contrary to strong signals Wednesday, still had not signed a contract as of midday Thursday that would govern race meetings in 2020 and 2021.

Arlington went so far as to post an announcement Wednesday that the suburban Chicago track and the ITHA, the representative horsemen’s group in the area, had “reached a tentative agreement” on a contract. Had the contract been signed, an abbreviated 2020 racing season was expected to be approved during a Thursday meeting of the Illinois Racing Board. Instead, the IRB recessed the meeting until Friday at 1 p.m. Board chairman Daniel Beiser suggested that if the parties didn’t come to an agreement by then, the IRB could pull the plug on a 2020 season.

The meet, should it take place, would start July 24 with the backstretch opening during the first week in July. The season would run 30 days, sans spectators, with three-day race weeks and eight-race cards Thursday through Saturday, post time 2 p.m. or 2:30 Central.

There will be no open stakes races this year, meaning that the Arlington Million program will go on hiatus, but the Million and its attendant Grade 1 turf stakes, the Beverly D. and the Secretariat, are expected to return in 2021. How they’re paid for, through the purse account or with some contribution from track owner Churchill Downs Inc., will be determined by how much purse money is generated before the 2021 racing season.

A primary hurdle to signing the contract involves how those 2021 purses will be set. David McCaffrey, executive director of the ITHA, testified that the formulas in the contract stipulating the distribution of purse money were “built on the assumption” that Arlington would be awarded roughly the same number of racing days in 2021 as this year. The ITHA insists the contract cover what happens if Arlington’s schedule meaningfully changes next year.

The ITHA and the horsemen have lobbed contract proposals back and forth for months. They met for a socially distanced, in-person negotiation mediated by Illinois Racing Board commissioner Thomas McCauley and executive director Domenic DiCera on June 6 at Hawthorne, but failed to reach a deal that weekend. Negotiations ramped up again this week in advance of Thursday’s IRB meeting.

Tony Petrillo, Arlington’s president, asked that McCauley and IRB executive director DiCera be brought back in to mediate the latest disagreement. Petrillo said with IRB participation the deal could get done “in a half-hour,” but without it there might not be a contract. “We’re moving further apart,” he said. The board set up a call for Friday morning between Arlington and the ITHA mediated by McCauley and DiCera while urging the parties to strike an agreement themselves Thursday afternoon.

Arlington has generated little purse money during the economic freeze brought on by the coronavirus; purses at the track are funded almost entirely through betting, and Arlington’s off-track-betting parlors have been slow to reopen. Testimony at the meeting said the Arlington OTBs either were closed or minimally staffed last weekend, and that winning wagers were paid out in vouchers, not cash.

Arlington said in late May and early June that its business model precluded racing without fans, but eventually moved off that position. The track and CDI declined last summer to apply for a casino license while the state’s other two tracks, Hawthorne and Fairmount, filed applications.

Hawthorne committed in May to running a fall-winter Thoroughbred meeting, and Arlington’s opening at would at least give Chicago horsemen some stability during the rest of a chaotic 2020.