Oregon Gov. Kate Brown Pressured Regulator to Nix Grants Pass HHR Machines

Oregon Gov. Kate John Brown (D) has torpedoed an covering for 225 historical horse racing machines (HHRs) for Oregon’s in conclusion surviving pureblood racetrack, Grants Pass Downs.

The track’s owner, Dutch people Bros. Coffee magnate Travis Boersma, wanted the machines for a new amusement center, The Flying Lark. He hoped the Lark would assist reinvigorate racing inward the state.

But inwards a letter of the alphabet finally calendar week to the Oregon Racing Commission (ORC), Brown emphasized it would be more than its members’ jobs were worth to approve the application.

“If members of the Commission voter turnout to have any action mechanism inconsistent with the law, as interpreted by the Beaver State Department of Justice [DOJ], I would regard such carry on as wayward to my expectations for your appointment. This could supply grounds to pundit remotion from the appointment,” wrote John Brown inward a alphabetic character seen by local NBC affiliate KOBI.

ORC Reluctant

Brown reiterated that the land DOJ had unity hebdomad earliest issued an opinion that HHR machines were more akin to slots and lottery games than the pari-mutuel gymnastic horse rush betting permitted at racetracks.

In a nine-page opinion, the DOJ said than no more more 75 HHRs should follow permitted at any ace locale because it would violate the banning on casinos inward the state.

Only federally recognised tribes are allowed to operate casinos inward Oregon, and Boersma’s plans hold faced a backlash from a collation of tribal operators.

On Friday, the ORC turned downward the application, but begrudgingly so.

ORC executive director Jack McGrail made it decipherable that he disagreed with the DOJ opinion. He pointed to a banker's bill passed past the general assembly inward 2012 that authorized “mutuel wagering on a Equus caballus run displayed as a video or audio frequency recording.”

While i have got great honour for the DOJ, their ruling is clearly at odds with the ruling of legislative counsel when the enabling statute was enacted,” he said, as reported past CBS affiliate KTVL.

“I don’t cogitate that at that place is any mistaking that the law-makers knowingly and designedly tossed a life preserver to our industry (horse racing) when they passed HHR legislation, and this opinion will clearly frustrate that intention and pitch a serious blow,” he added.

‘Casinos Have Roulette’

Commissioner Jacques Charles said the Flying Lark was definitely “not a casino.”

“Casinos make roulette wheels, they feature snake eyes tables, they get Blackjack, they feature drawing drawings, and Flying Lark has none of these,” he said. “All it is is a twain of C historical racing machines,” said commissioner, Charles IX Williamson.

The military commission acknowledged that its hands were fastened by the governor, but hoped the go forth mightiness one mean solar day live resolved in court.

Boersma said the conclusion meant that 200 people would turn a loss their jobs at the death of the month. But he added that he would combat the DOJ’s opinion, which he described as “wrong and deep flawed.”