By Paul Woolverton, woolvertonp@fayettevillenc.com or (919) 828-7641.
RALEIGH - State Sen. David Weinstein hopes to make gambling legal for the annual Stoneybrook Steeplechase.
The steeplechase is held in April at the nonprofit Carolina Horse Park at Five Points in western Hoke County.
Most gambling is illegal in North Carolina.
Legal betting would boost attendance at the steeplechase, said Roger Secrist, chairman of the board of the Carolina Horse Park Foundation. He said the region is losing an estimated $25 million because the Nextel Cup series will no longer hold a NASCAR race at the North Carolina Speedway in Rockingham.
"There's a chance to replace that $25 million," Secrist said.
The steeplechase attracts 12,000 to 15,000 people, Secrist said. This year, he said, the races netted $75,000. He thinks that legal, organized betting could draw 50,000 people.
If the steeplechase grows more popular, he said, it would foster growth in horse farming and related industries, Secrist said. "Just with a stroke of a pen it creates a whole industry in this case, which I think will be very beneficial for North Carolina agriculture."
If the plan proceeds, Weinstein would draft legislation for the 2005 session of the General Assembly authorizing parimutuel betting one day each year at the horse park.
In parimutuel betting, everyone who has bet on the winner splits the take, minus a fee for overhead. It's a common system of gambling on horses and dogs.
Weinstein, a Democrat from Lumberton, said he is recruiting support from both parties. He thinks he can get the law changed for Stoneybrook despite North Carolina's long aversion to gambling.
"If they can show us a family oriented type affair with one day of parimutuel betting on the steeplechase, I think it would be a great thing to introduce to the state," Weinstein said.
John Rustin doesn't agree. He is director of government relations for the socially conservative N.C. Family Policy Council. The organization opposes legalized gaming, saying it leads to crime, compulsive gambling and hurts the economy.
The betting would not end at Stoneybrook, Rustin said.
"Other areas of the state will want to do the same thing, so we will have racetracks popping up everywhere," he said.
It also would open the door for the Cherokee reservation in the North Carolina mountains to have year-round betting on horses, Rustin predicted.
Gambling payouts
Under state video poker laws, payouts in the form of cash or other valuable prizes are illegal. But the Cherokees, under federal law, can operate a casino and pay cash.
The same thing would happen with parimutuel betting, Rustin said.
John Hood, a long-time critic of the Carolina Horse Park, likes the idea of allowing betting at the Stoneybrook Steeplechase. Hood is president of the John Locke Foundation in Raleigh.
The Locke Foundation has criticized the horse park because it has received grants from the Golden LEAF foundation, which was set up to distribute revenue from the national tobacco settlement to encourage new economic development.
The Locke Foundation has regarded the grants for the Carolina Horse Park as a waste of public money on entertainment for wealthy people.
The money raised by gaming could "get the horse park off the public dole and let the people who want to patronize it pay the bills," Hood said.
Secrist said the horse park would continue to seek grants that could help the economy in Hoke County.
