No More Horsing Around With Playfair Dark This Fall, Those In The Horse Business Suffer
He found a buyer for one of his horses. He sold some of his tools. When he runs out of tools he says he’ll sell his home.
Darrell Erickson has to make a living.
For now he sits with his horses in Barn 14-A on the back side at Playfair, waiting.
Waiting for what he’s not sure. A miracle, maybe, to restore his livelihood that he sees wasting away.
The recent brilliant blue October afternoons and crisp evenings - the signature days and nights of horse racing in Spokane - are aggravating reminders of what the sport and the people in it have come to.
On a normal October weekend horses would be running, as they have run at Playfair since 1935. Off-track sites statewide would be attracting the gamblers who feed the purses that feed Erickson.
Only the darkest two years of World War II separated horses from the horse players in Spokane.
On a normal year, Erickson would be working his horses, including his favorite, Mackees My Name, up to their ideal conditioned races. A 7-year-old gelded son of Black Mackee, Mackees My Name would be entered in with non-winners of two lifetime. He’s tough in that company.
“He’s only won once but he’s run a lot of seconds,” Erickson said. “I can always count on him getting a check. He’s training real good this year but I’ve backed off. You can’t get ‘em too fit. They won’t do nothing stale.”
Erickson calls him his breadwinner. The breadwinner has become an expensive pet, a jobless friend with more energy right now than prospects.
Playfair is open for training. Erickson is going through the motions with nowhere to run. The track has yet to open for business, the sport is in limbo here and, with each passing day, Darrell Erickson is closer to going under.
He’s taken a double hit. As an owner/trainer and a manure hauler, he works both ends of the business. The horses cooped up in their stalls can’t go to the post and bring back a check. And without incentive to stay, the horse population at Playfair is dwindling, leaving less to be hauled off.
Erickson, 61, has almost no income and no pension.
“I’ll have one starting in May,” he said. “I’m going to sign up for social security, start early.”
What galls Erickson is that Playfair has a potential investor - the Muckleshoot Tribe - with the announced intent of turning the track into a profitable venture. The leaders of the racing industry fear the Muckleshoots, who own a casino 8 miles from the state’s new race track in Auburn.
Fearful that a casino operator might run a race track beyond the best interests of racing in the state, two of the three voting members of the racing commission have turned down the Muckleshoot request for a license to assume operations at Playfair.
While lawyers argue and the industry remains divided, while weeds poke through the parking lot and the front side of the track begs for attention, some Spokane horsemen - running out of time - are trailering off to Portland, Auburn, California.
Others, like Erickson, remain on the grounds here, determined to run at home or not run at all. Erickson says most would return to Spokane if the state could be convinced that there’s still time to put together a ‘96-97 season here.
So Erickson waits and hopes for the gates to open, wondering why the jobs and tradition of the small track with the long history are sacrificed by state and industry leaders who look at Emerald Downs with blinkers on, fixed as they are on the notion that as Emerald goes, so goes the future.
The track in Auburn has the statewide simulcast wagering dates this fall that traditionally went to Playfair.
Blame for that has been assessed. It’s no longer news that most horse people here say state and industry leaders have failed them.
“I get pretty down on the commission, the governor, the legislature,” Erickson said. “They’re not thinking of the people involved in this situation, the jobs and the money that are being lost.”
This horseman has lived through bad times before. He underwent heart surgery 11 years ago and has had back surgery. In 1980 his wife died. He and his lady friend, Dorothy, whom he refers to as his wife, are “going to hang in until I see we’re definitely not going to run.
“If that’s the way it’s going to be I’ll probably sell three of these horses,” he said, nodding at a string of seven stabled and training at Playfair. Five are his, two belong to his son, Darrell. “I’ll turn two of them out, get squared away with my debts, find a motorhome, get hooked up - I got a four-horse trailer - and head south.
“Right now I’m down to where I’ve got to sell my woodworking tools to feed the horses. It’s got me down to where I got to make a bank payment on the ranch. The horses usually made the bank payment. I haven’t been able to run horses to make the payment so I’m selling my place.”
He vows to sell the 17-acre place in Potlatch, Idaho, he’s had for 10 years before he’ll send horses to Emerald Downs.
“I’d rather sell than go to Emerald,” he said. “I’ll sell my stock. Emerald isn’t being fair to other horsemen.”
After 31 years of owning and training horses, he knows that’s an idle threat. Darrell Erickson can’t afford to run at Emerald.
“I can’t pay what they charge for a bail of hay and a bail of straw,” he concedes. “They won’t let you haul in (he hauls hay to the track from his Potlatch home). You have to buy from vendors. It’s not a friendly place unless you have a bankroll.”
Emerald Downs over the long haul will miss Playfair, Erickson said.
“Playfair doesn’t hurt the track over there,” he said. “It never has. Horses here with potential could go to Emerald. How can you develop potential without competition?”
So why didn’t he pack up and make a run for it before his financial shape went critical?
“I figured Playfair would run,” he said, “because last spring I talked to (racing commission chair) Barbara Shinpoch. She said Playfair would always run. Now, I wish I had that on tape. I’d like to remind her of it.
“It ain’t fun when you get this age, you’ve had surgery, you’re limited to what you can do. Being shut down this year, right now I can’t afford nothin’.
“The racing commission - the state of Washington - is putting me out of business if they don’t run here.”
Encouraged by virtually all segments of the industry on the West Side, the racing commission has turned down the Muckleshoots’ application for a license to operate the track. That’s the immediate issue but the greater fear that some horsemen share is that the state seems to see no room for the Spokane track in the Seattle market.
Horsemen here have a stake in how much if anything the tribe’s legal muscle can do in court.
In the meantime is there anything more to say?
Erickson steps closer to the recorder, clears his throat, delivers his parting shot the best way he knows how - short and respectfully to the point.
“The commission ought to give us a thought, give us a try, let us have some racing dates.
“Thank you.”
, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Color Photo