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Arkansas Horse Racing

Arkansas has slot machines at their horse racing tracks now, and everyone is going hope to make their own rags to riches story with every push of the button. The two tracks, Oaklawn in Hot Springs and Southland in West Memphis, managed to get the slot machines legalized last year, and it has taken off for the tracks.

The Arkansas Racing Commission reports more than $11 million in slot machine wagers for Oaklawn in January 2007 alone. That means about $25,000 a day for the track. Southland comes in a bit lower with $8 million, but they have a lower payoff percentage so they are making $45,000 a day. With this kind of money coming in, the tracks say that it will be a billion dollar industry in no time. That would equate to roughly $100 million for the track before taxes, and the tracks anticipate reaching that goal in no time.

It has also affected the horse industry in terms of their purses. According to the Blood-Horse, a horse racing industry magazine, daily average purses have increased since slot machines have been legalized. Oaklawn is running purses around $290,000 a day, up from $275,000 last year. The track says that they have added about a million to their purses this year, which will only serve to strengthen the bond between the tracks and the horses. The tracks that offer more money get the better horses.

Southland is not far behind, adding almost twice the staff that they had before, and remodeling the horse side of their tracks to catch up with the improvements they made to the slot machine part of the track. With more money coming in all the time, each of the tracks will be able to offer bigger and bigger purses, which will only bring in better and better horses. The idea is that the better the horses the more people will come to watch them run - thus ensuring that the tracks do not close for at least another couple of years.

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