State OTBs hit the COVID-aid jackpot

And they’re off — to a government bailout.

Five of New York’s horse-racing bookie offices with the state Off-Track Betting Corp. are raking in millions of dollars apiece in federal loans meant to keep small businesses afloat amid the coronavirus pandemic — and critics are crying foul.

The regional OTBs of Nassau County and Suffolk County on Long Island and the Western Regional OTB branch each received about $2.5 million in 1 percent loans, according to records from the federal Small Business Administration obtained by The Post.

Meanwhile, the Capital District Regional OTB qualified for $1.2 million, and the Catskill Regional OTB received between $350,000 and $1 million.

While the SBA allows private businesses that receive gambling revenue to get Paycheck Protection Program loans, government entities aren’t supposed to partake in the handout.

And since New York’s OTBs were created by the state Legislature in 1970 as “public-benefit corporations’’ — operated by local governments through political appointees, with their revenue going back to state and local governments — they are clearly not private, critics say.

“How they qualified as a quasigovernment entity is a mystery,” said a well-placed government official familiar with the PPP.

“Their CEOs and chairs are politically appointed,’’ he said of New York’s OTBs, including Nassau, whose chief is appointed by county legislators. “Their workers receive New York state pensions.’’

Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-Manhattan), who chairs the House Committee on Oversight and Reform, said she plans to push the SBA for answers.

“The loans are supposed to go to small businesses. I’m going to question the appropriateness of the OTB loans,” she told The Post on Sunday.

“The loans are only supposed to go to private employers, not public,’’ added Maloney, who joined other Democratic House members last month to accuse the SBA of stonewalling when it was pressed on how it has been managing COVID-19 financialrelief programs.

Rep. Peter King (R-LI) said he pushed to help get those PPP loans for the Nassau and Suffolk OTBs — but acknowledged that there were discussions between the OTBs and SBA over whether the betting entities were too governmental to receive loans.

He said the agency eventually ruled that the OTBs were “entitled’’ to the financial relief.

“The OTBs are an asset to the communities. The counties get revenues from [them],” he said.

Former Republican Sen. Al D’Amato’s lobbying firm, Park Strategies, also helped push for the loans.

“I believe we’re entitled to it, and we asked for it,” he told The Post.

“OTB has people who are working. If you keep people working, you’re saving the taxpayers money.”

The SBA did not return a request for comment.

New York City’s OTB was such a mess that it went bankrupt and shut down for good in 2010.

These loans are supposed to go to private employers—

not public. — US Rep. Carolyn Maloney (right), on the millions dispersed to state Off-Track Betting Corporation branches