Closure of racetrack hits Sallisaw economy hard

By CLIFTON ADCOCK Associated Press

SALLISAW, Okla. — The LED sign at Blue Ribbon Downs’ main entrance is dark and the front gate is locked. Chest-high weeds grow between the horse stables — themselves beginning to show the grind of time and disrepair.

A piece of tin roof is missing here, a door is hanging off its hinges there.

The sounds of thundering hooves and cheering crowds has been lost to time, replaced with the hum of traffic on nearby Interstate 40.

Many of the tack shops and stores around Blue Ribbon Downs have been shuttered, their windows and doors secured behind burglar bars.

Pastures along U.S. Highway 64, once filled with horses, are now mostly empty.

When the race track closed in late November, it took more than a piece of racing history with it — it also took the livelihoods of many whose jobs were connected with the track and left many more in the community wondering what would come next. Racing industry observers say tracks that offer only live racing are no longer economically viable.

The track has a colorful and sometimes dark history, but it has long served as an important economic force in this town in east-central Oklahoma.

Blue Ribbon Downs was about to be sold at a sheriff’s auction in 2003 when the Choctaw Nation unexpectedly bought it. It’s just within the Cherokee tribal boundary, and that tribe was expected to make the winning bid.

It was a dramatic move, but it ended with the Choctaws closing the track seven years later. Within a month, it was sold to the Cherokee Nation.

Although few expect to see sanctioned racing there again, the Cherokees may have plans for the track.

Butch Schiesel stands in the shade of the dusty stables where some of his few remaining horses stay. A trainer for more than 40 years, he’s seen firsthand many of the track’s ups and downs and how they affected the community. But he’s never seen anything as severe as this.

“It’s killed me,” he said. “This is the fewest horses I’ve had in 30 years.”

Rex Brooks, the owner of Rex Brooks Training Stables, was one of the largest racehorse trainers in the area, but the track’s closure has forced him to cut his number of horses by more than half, and even those are difficult to get ready to race.

The Oklahoma Horse Racing Commission requires that horses have workouts on OHRC-licensed tracks before they can enter official races. That forces Brooks and other trainers in the area to spend countless hours and gallons of fuel to take their horses to Remington Park in Oklahoma City, Will Rogers Downs in Claremore or Fair Meadows in Tulsa.

Brooks said he rarely gets home before 1 a.m.

“We’re on the road day and night,” he said. “It’s expensive running them back and forth up and down the road. It’s shut us down a bunch because of the hauling.”

The economic fallout of Blue Ribbon Downs’ closure is painfully obvious to many other businesses in Sallisaw.

“Blue Ribbon Downs has been a very big asset to this part of the community, the whole county for many, many years,” said Dan Callahan, the manager of Farmer’s Cooperative Feed Store. “It feeds a lot of families around here in more than one way, not just in horse racing — it supplies a good industry here and involves a lot of family-owned operations as well as the corporations.

“It has affected us all.”

Marilea Berry, a manager at Blue Ribbon Inn in Sallisaw, said the motel had seen the effects.

“We did have a lot of people who came for the races,” she said. “That’s gone.”

City Manager Bill Baker said Sallisaw was facing a decline in sales tax revenue, but he didn’t know whether to attribute that to the wider recession or just Blue Ribbon Downs.

A comparison of Sallisaw sales tax information from the Oklahoma Tax Commission for December to May — the period in which the track has been closed and for which data is available — shows a significant decline between the 2007-2008 and 2008-2009 fiscal years.

The numbers show a 10 percent drop in sales tax revenue for that period from the average of the past two years — twice the percentage drop seen in nearby Poteau, which has a similar population and sales tax revenue. The drop is also more than twice as big as that of Miami, Okla., which has a similar amount of sales tax revenue.

Tony Venters, a co-owner of Greenleaf Properties in Sallisaw, said he had seen a large number of ranch owners moving on since the closure.

“There’s more of them being forced to leave because they cannot make a living here,” he said. “From my perspective both as a citizen, a Realtor and someone who loves horse racing, it’s very important. It’s what brought a lot of people to this community. It is gone. As of today, it’s sitting there.”

Jeff Mayo, the associate publisher of the Sequoyah County Times, said the track’s closing not only affected workers and businesses — it shut down one of the biggest meeting halls in town, forcing local groups and organizations to find other arrangements.

“The meeting space was important to the community because it could hold so many folks and serve dinner there,” he said.

The Cherokee Nation has said it has no solid plans for Blue Ribbon Downs, but officials doubt it will ever operate as a sanctioned racetrack again.

“There’s not anything on the near-term horizon,” said the tribe’s spokesman, Mike Miller. “We want businesses to be viable there, we want to create jobs there. We invest in Sequoyah County tremendously. When a business shuts down, whether the Choctaws own it or anybody else, it has ripple effects and is not good.”

Amanda Clinton, a spokeswoman for Cherokee Nation Entertainment, said the tribe was looking at opening Blue Ribbon Downs as a training track. But it’s not known when a decision will be made.

The horse trainers and business owners know that the chances of seeing the track reopened for racing are slim, but they hope the Cherokee Nation turns the property into something that can help the community.

“If a place can’t make money, you can’t afford to have it,” Callahan said. “It’s sure needed for the community; it’s needed for the horsemen. We’re all hoping some buyer will come along, somebody will see some interest, change some directions on it, but get something going again.”

But, for now, the historic track sits dark and empty. Residents say it may always serve as a reminder of what might have been.

“This is horse country over here and it has been for a long time,” Venters said. “And all of a sudden it’s just gone. And our facility is sitting there right on the interstate deteriorating, which makes me sick.

“It really could have been something special.”

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Information from: Tulsa World, http://www.tulsaworld.com

 

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