N.Y. State Conceals Terms of Belmont Park Taxpayer-Funded Loan; PETA Files FOIL Appeal

For Immediate Release:
January 27, 2025

Contact:
David Perle 202-483-7382

The New York State Gaming Commission has inexplicably refused to release signed and unredacted loan documents for the renovation of Belmont Park horseracing track, in response to an open-records request filed under New York’s Freedom of Information Law (FOIL) from attorneys for PETA, calling into question the details of the secret deal between the state and the private New York Racing Association (NYRA). So, today, attorneys for PETA filed an appeal to their decision and demanded that the commission comply with open-records laws so that the public has full knowledge of what the state has required—or failed to require—of NYRA.

Gov. Kathy Hochul proposed the loan in her 2023 budget with no coherent plan for repayment, and it was then passed by the state legislature, despite NYRA’s long history of fiscal irresponsibility. NYRA declared bankruptcy in 2006 and was bailed out by the state with $105 million, approximately $80 million of which was used to pay off non-state debt. Just four years later, the association was revealed to have wrongfully withheld $8.5 million from bettors, resulting in a state takeover. It was reprivatized in 2017. Though the association is required to pay an annual franchise fee to the state, it has not done so in over ten years. Additionally, New York props up horse racing with $230 million in annual subsidies.

“New York State has thrown nearly a half-billion taxpayer dollars at a private corporation with a history of financial incompetency and now denies New Yorkers their right to know how that loan will be repaid,” says PETA Senior Vice President Kathy Guillermo. “New York props up an industry infamous for drugging, abusing, and killing horses, and its secrecy should make everyone question what it’s hiding.”

On January 9, the New York Appellate Division upheld a trial court’s dismissal of a lawsuit brought by two taxpayers seeking to block the state from lending $455 million to the New York Racing Association (NYRA) to renovate Belmont Park. The Court declined to address the constitutionality of the loan and instead ruled that the lawsuit was moot because the renovations at Belmont had already begun and instead ruled for an industry known for the deaths and drugging of horses.

Belmont Park is one of the deadliest racetracks in the United States, accounting for at least 322 horse deaths between 2014 and 2021, making it the fourth-deadliest track in the U.S. during that time span. Approximately 1,600 horses have died at New York tracks since 2009. Attendance at Belmont Park has dropped 88% over the last several decades, and there’s no credible evidence to indicate that renovating the park will increase it.

PETA—whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to use for entertainment”—points out that Every Animal Is Someone and offers free Empathy Kits for people who need a lesson in kindness. For more information, please visit PETA.org or follow PETA on X, Facebook, or Instagram.