YOU'VE GOT to admire Magna Entertainment Corp.'s desperation - or, shall we say, chutzpah. With Preakness week blooming, executives of the Canadian firm - owners of the Pimlico and Laurel racetracks - have launched a public push for a special session of the state legislature to legalize slot machines in Maryland.
They're threatening to stop investing in horse racing in Maryland and maybe even pull the Preakness, the second leg of racing's Triple Crown, out of Pimlico, where it was born in 1873 and has been run continuously since 1909. And they've got Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. and Baltimore Mayor Martin O'Malley, a likely Democratic gubernatorial contender, coming close to making threats on their behalf.
"The bottom line is Magna is a business operation. ... Maryland's not making it, and to the extent Maryland's not making it, we have a problem. ... It's not the governor threatening. It's fact," Mr. Ehrlich reportedly pronounced at last week's Board of Public Works meeting.
How's that, governor? Are you saying what's bad for Magna is bad for Maryland? Well, we're at least glad to have confirmation of who's running this circus. But if slots would be so good for Maryland, why have drives to legalize them at tracks and elsewhere failed for three straight years now?
The answer: When you get down to it, very few Marylanders welcome slots parlors in their own communities. So even the most rabid supporters have been flummoxed when it comes to putting together a broadly acceptable package of sites for the parlors.
Perhaps because of that very big obstacle - and mounting pressures on its management from investors - Magna has emerged from its behind-the-scenes maneuvering in Annapolis to publicly hold Maryland racing and Preakness hostage. That galling ploy takes a lot of nerve, but it would be highly unrealistic to think it's sufficient to warrant calling a special legislative session.
At a meeting Friday with the governor and the pro-slots Senate president, Thomas V. Mike Miller, Magna sought some sort of slots compromise; the company would accept the relatively limited plan passed by a single vote in the House this year (which includes slots at Laurel). But tellingly, House Speaker Michael E. Busch, slots' chief foe in Annapolis, did not attend the meeting. And it's very likely that even that House bill couldn't pass again - with supportive delegates from Frederick and Harford counties having taken a lot of heat from constituents right after their vote because that bill would put slots barns in their home counties.
Also, don't forget that while Magna is free to try to move the Preakness out of Maryland, it can't relocate Pimlico and Laurel, in which it bought a majority stake for $117.5 million in 2002. And a 1985 state law gives the state the right to retaliate: Maryland has first refusal rights on a Preakness sale, and it could raise taxes on racing and cut Pimlico's racing dates if Magna were to move it.
Magna, of course, is fully entitled to pursue its interests. But the governor, the Senate president and the House speaker should make sure Maryland just as aggressively pursues what's good for Marylanders. And most communities around the state have already indicated that slots aren't part of that.
