Maine Harness Racing Commission Meets to Assign 2009 Race Dates
Scarborough Downs and the nine agricultural fairs were awarded licenses and race dates in compliance with the November 12 meeting. Bangor Raceway's license application approval was tabled until the commission's December meeting. The commission's office is in the process of doing a background check on Bangor Raceway's parent company Penn National due to ownership changes within Penn National. Upon the results of that background check, Bangor Raceway will be awarded its license and race dates at the commission's December meeting.
You can view the 2009 race dates at this link. Bangor's applied race dates are grayed out in the calendar.
Other information that was discussed during the meeting included the amount of dashes that should be held due to the capacity of the paddocks at the various tracks. Of major concern was the Northern Maine Fair and Oxford Fair. Suzanne Grover, president of Oxford Fair addressed the commission and stated that Oxford will construct two more structures in its paddock for four additional races.
Bangor Raceway stated that it's new 96 stall paddock will be ready for opening day on April 17 and will have a carrot in every stall during its Grand Opening.
Bangor Raceway also stated that it is in conversations with the city of Bangor to limit the amount of extra-curricular activities that are held directly on the racetrack surface. Demolition derbies, tractor pulls and fair parking have been held on the track surface in previous years. Commission Chairman George McHale stated that the City of Bangor needs to respect the amount of money that Penn National has invested in the track surface only to have it damaged by city events. It was also noted that the scope of racing at Bangor Raceway has changed in the last few years from a track with 26 days of racing to 61 days in 2009.
Cumberland Fair also stated that it is looking into rebuilding a lighting system for night time racing. If that is approved by the fair association, Cumberland may ask for night racing in 2010 and also ask for double cards for Wednesday and Saturday of their fair. In the past Cumberland raced double cards on those days and it was very successful.