Push for Decatur racino
by Neil Milbert
With bankrupt Hawthorne Race Course in suburban Chicago on life support and the spring session of the state legislature in its final month the push for passage of a law permitting a standardbred track/casino to be built in downstate Decatur has taken on added urgency for members of the Illinois harness racing community.
“We’ve got our [lobbying] team down here,” said Illinois Harness Horsemen’s Association executive director Tony Somone, speaking from the state capital in Springfield. “We’re trying to get a House bill across the finish-line before the end of the session on May 31.”
A bill calling for the Decatur racino and also for an end to the provision in state law that allows Hawthorne to veto any racetrack/casino project within 30 miles of its property passed the Illinois Senate 49-8 last fall.
While no one has made a concerted effort to build in suburban Chicago if the boundary is eliminated Conor Lucas and his father, Larry, (son-in-law of the late Illinois Racing Board chairman Gene Lamb) are the prime-movers in the Decatur project.
Decatur is a city of approximately 70,000 located midway between Champaign-Urbana, where the University of Illinois is located, and Springfield. It’s about a 45-minute drive to each of those two thriving communities.
“Geographically, Decatur would be a great fit,” said Conor Lucas. “The site is on the west boundary of the city, basically where Interstate 72 and Route 72 meet, and across the street from the Convention Center. This was our first pick of the sites. It has great visibility from the Interstate and it’s a good billboard for the city.
“That’s why we chose the name Decatur Downs. We wanted to have the city unofficially identified as part of the project. The city is very enthusiastic and Macon County also supports it. In addition to being great for Illinois racing it would be great for economic development in the city and county. This is a $100 million-plus project with all union construction jobs.”
State Senator Dorris Turner emphasized that Decatur Downs also could provide as many as 300 permanent jobs.
The Lucas father and son are the principals in Decatur Downs but they also have outside investors involved, solidifying its financial foundation.
If the lawmakers pass the enabling legislation, the tentative date for the opening of Decatur Downs is the second quarter of 2028.
Under the Illinois statute the casino gambling positions will be capped at 900.
“Our plans call for some grandstand seating but we want to make the racing part [of the racino] more of a family event with coolers and picnic tables,” Conor said. “The paddock will be easily accessible and fans can stand on the rail to watch the races.
“We’ll have some barns but the horses will be mostly ship-ins. We want to utilize the State Fairgrounds’ barns [in Springfield].”
If Decatur Downs is granted a license, Somone said the members of his organization hope to have “some kind of meeting in 2027” (under the track’s auspices) while the racino is being built.
Conor and his father are agreeable to discussing such an arrangement at the State Fairgrounds as well as for a temporary casino at another location.
“Let’s first get the okay from the legislature and then work out the details with Larry and Conor, the Racing Board and the Gaming Board,” Somone said.
Decatur Downs would be the first track built in Illinois since East Moline Downs opened in 1973.
Later renamed Quad City Downs to broaden its regional appeal it served as a feeder for the now-defunct Chicago harness tracks, Sportsman’s Park, Maywood Park, and Balmoral Park, that were flourishing at the time.
Arlington Park bought it in 1988 and conducted harness meetings until September 1993 when live racing was terminated and it became an off-track betting outlet.
Illinois now has only two surviving tracks — Hawthorne, which, since 2016, has been conducting both thoroughbred and harness racing, and Fairmount Park, a thoroughbred track and casino located in Collinsville, across the Mississippi River from St. Louis.
The only other pari-mutuel meetings in Illinois are a handful of late summer dates at the State Fairs in Springfield and DuQuoin.
Larry and Conor are hoping that Hawthorne survives and finds financial ways and means to construct its long-awaited casino but limits its racing to the thoroughbreds and a new harness track/casino is built in Chicago’s southwest suburbs.
Thus, there would be a thoroughbred and a harness track in the Chicago metropolitan area, a Decatur harness track in central Illinois and a downstate thoroughbred track across the river from St. Louis and they all would complement one another.
Hawthorne currently is conducting twice-weekly thoroughbred programs that began on April 19 and are scheduled to continue through Nov. 1.
All 14 of Hawthorne’s Suburban Downs harness dates in January and February had to be canceled because of the track’s inability to pay its huge number of creditors and the subsequent Jan. 26 suspension of the Suburban Downs racing license by the Illinois Racing Board.
Hawthorne filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy on Feb. 27 and on April 20 U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Timothy Barnes issued an order on Hawthorne’s debtor-in-possession loan from JDI Loans, enabling harness owners, trainers, and drivers to be reimbursed for the $1,345,382 they were owed in bounced and uncashed checks and $1,560,073 in frozen purse account funds.
But those amounts are figurative molehills in the mountain of debts an assortment of other creditors are pursuing.
Hawthorne is taking offers to either obtain a racing operation/racino partner or sell the land for real estate development.
Under Chapter 11, the target for a sale is July 13.
“Then, we should know if they’re either going to have a [racing] partner or if they’ll have to file for Chapter 7 bankruptcy,” Somone said.
All of Hawthorne’s assets would be liquidated as a consequence of a Chapter 7 filing and that would almost certainly mean the death of racing at the 109-year-old track.
