CRIST (NYT OP-ED): Opp to Fix NY OTB's
 

Typically searing and savvy Steve Crist piece though this time reaching a wider audience than the searing and savvy DRF stuff. In A NY Times Op-Ed piece today, Crist gives the background to, and pleads to take the opportunity for reform of, the state's OTB Corporation quandry...


Not to be missed:
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/30/op...gewanted=print


The biggest problem with OTB is that it was designed as a sprawling jobs program, not as a streamlined wagering service. When the state’s racetrack operators turned up their patrician noses at the prospect of running OTB back in 1971, politicians eagerly jumped in.

They instituted a shamefully piggish system where the state was divided into six regions, each with its own generously staffed public benefit corporation. Each of the six regions — New York City, Nassau, Suffolk, Catskill, Capitol and Western — has its own executive, legal and marketing departments, its own technology systems and now its own phone and Internet-betting operations.


And for those that do not understand why the OTB Corporation system had become a burden on the chance for profit at NYRA....

New York was the first of more than 20 racing states to institute off-track betting, and all that have followed have rejected its flawed model of multiple regional corporations and of competition between tracks and government agencies.

Instead of issuing empty and fiscally irresponsible threats of a shutdown, the mayor should apply his business background and acumen to exploring consolidation and privatization. OTB is not losing money now, and it could provide both higher profits and better services if it were operated as an efficient business rather than a bureaucratic boondoggle.

Isn't OTB a non profit?

Is there a better writer in the world, covering any topic, than Crist?

It's true. He puts everyone else to shame. He has the ability in all situations to see through all the murk to the heart of the issue.

if horse racing were to have a commissioner, he'd be the guy.

appears the Mayor has other things on his mind....

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22445078/

I hope NY finally privatizes the OTBs. Maybe that is where Capital Play could really make their mark.

Outstanding piece! Crist has done it again!