Although The Woodlands received a special use permit from the Unified Government April 28 to reopen its horse racetrack facility at 97th and Leavenworth Road with slots, residents should not expect to see action on it this year.
Last weekend, a racino bill in the Kansas House did not advance.
Sen. Steve Fitzgerald, R-5th Dist., whose bill passed the Senate last year on increasing the amount of slots revenue that racetracks can keep, said he would not expect to see any movement on the issue until next session. It basically ran out of time this year, he added.
The House considered another bill in the final days of this session, which had included an option for Wichita citizens to vote again on approving slots. Wichita residents turned down slots, while Wyandotte County approved slots at the racetracks in a public vote in 2007.
The Kansas attorney general issued an opinion on April 22 that a re-vote in Wichita, as allowed by House Bill 2537, could result in a breach of contract with state casinos, requiring the state to repay the millions of dollars in privilege fees to the Kansas casinos, and the state might even have to repay the privilege fees if it was determined there was not a breach of contract.
House GOP leadership was quoted as responding to the attorney general’s opinion, saying they did not want to risk a breach of contract.
That bill, 2537, would have increased gaming revenue to the racetrack manager from 25 percent to 64.5 percent in the first and second year of operation, and then to 60 percent in third and future years. The state’s share would have been reduced from 40 to 22 percent. The Unified Government’s share of the slots revenue would have been reduced from 3 percent to 2 percent under that bill.
Sen. Fitzgerald said there is actually a lot of support across the board for the racetrack bill, and he thought his bill would have passed the House if it could have made it out of committee. His bill would not have run into any controversy from the attorney general opinion, since it did not discuss a re-vote in Wichita.
He expects a racetrack bill will be back next year, and those who support it will continue to polish it.
Although he has not heard discussion of plans for next year, he said, “Reading the tea leaves, I would think they’re going to come back with the last thing they tried to get before they ran out of time.”
The Legislature is now adjourned and will come back for a day of final adjournment on June 1.