SAN ANTONIO -- Texans will spend an estimated $85 million over the Labor Day weekend in neighboring states' casinos, hotels and restaurants. One group says an easy way exists to keep that money in the Lone Star state, but not everyone is ready to bet on gambling.
The group, Win for Texas, has many a racetrack throughout Texas.
The grandstand at Retama Park has not seen a sizable crowd in quite some time. In it's 16th year of live racing, the park as well as other racetracks throughout Texas are suffering financially. Many are not turning a profit, thus forced to file for bankruptcy or worse - shutting down.
Now racetrack officials hope a Constitutional amendment will allow slot machines at their facilities to bail them out.
"It's hurting the Texas economy! It's hurting Texas jobs," said Doug Vair, director of marketing and publicity at Retama Park. "The racing and breeding industry has about 35,000 of us that are employed and unless something happens, all of those jobs will go away."
Win for Texas' solution is to legalize slot machines in racetracks. The group, made up of members of the Texas racing industry, says it would bring in about $2.5 billion in revenue, which presently is spent outside of Texas. They also argue gamblers would spend about $1.5 billion in related spending for hotels, shopping and other luxuries. They say the trickle down to other groups outside of the racetracks would mean about 75,000 new jobs in and outside of racing.
"The people here already want to gamble, they're just going out of state to play casinos and that's billions of dollars," Vair said. "Texas dollars are going out of state."
To make the group's solution happen, an amendment to the state constitution would be needed. However, those who oppose it argue casinos take money out of the local economy, they do not produce benefits like jobs and gambling is immoral. "I think it's addicting, so debt and addiction don't go together," said Tea Santos, owner of Speed Date SA.
Win for Texas wants the state legislature to give Texas voters the power to decide whether they want slot machines in racetracks and Native American reservations.
