Playfair Questioning Commission Motives

The Washington Horse Racing Commission is biased against Playfair Race Course because the state panel has a financial interest in Emerald Downs, the Muckleshoot Indian Tribe says.

Through its subsidiary, New Playfair Park Inc., the tribe renewed its request to the commission Thursday for permission to operate the track in Spokane.

Bruce Batson, commission executive director, dismissed the letter as a ploy for getting an outside agency to rule on New Playfair’s application, which the panel rejected earlier as incomplete, financially unsound and potentially damaging to Emerald Downs and Yakima Meadows. The commission also said the Muckleshoots would have a conflict of interest because they own a casino near Auburn.

A letter signed by New Playfair president Phillip Ziegler said tribal officials only recently learned of an agreement giving the state the first right to take over Emerald Downs if the Auburn track runs in the red.

“This agreement gives the … commission specifically an interest in ensuring that Emerald be as free from debt and as profitable as possible,” Ziegler wrote.

He requested an independent investigation into how the commission “acquired a property interest in a private business it was charged to regulate.”

Batson said the agreement was signed by the three commissioners with Ron Crockett, president of Northwest Racing Associations, which operates Emerald Downs, on March 21, 1995, to prevent a sellout like the one that resulted in the shutdown of Longacres Race Course in Renton in 1992.

Playfair’s current operators have held out the Muckleshoots’ plan as the only way to keep the 53-year-old track alive.

Earlier this month, the Muckleshoots failed to obtain a court order barring the commission from awarding racing dates while they appeal the panel’s denial of a license for them to operate Playfair.

A Thurston County Superior Court judge ruled that the tribe had to exhaust its administrative appeals with the commission before going to court.