The certainty of video lottery machines being installed in New England was the topic of conversation and discussion raised most often at each of the three horse-related annual winter meetings and awards banquets this past month.

Some of the legitimate concerns that horsemen questioned were: what are video lottery terminals, who will get the terminals, and what impact could the machines have on the industry.

Whether horsemen or citizens morally believe that Maine needs additional gambling was not an issue of concern. Primarily, horsemen were worried about the survival of a horse racing industry that last year generated $71,050,178 in total parimutuel handle (including off-track wagering) and credited $1,053,736 to the state’s General Fund.

Richard Crabtree, interim chair of the Maine State Harness Racing Commission, said Massachusetts and New Hampshire will have video lottery machines this year.

“It isn’t a question of whether or not they will have them, that time has passed, it’s now how long before they do,” Crabtree said.

The New England racing industry is tightly interconnected. Any legislative bill that is mandated elsewhere in New England creates a ripple affect at every racetrack in Maine.

Some Maine horsemen are convinced that when the Massachusetts and New Hampshire legislatures ratify video lottery machines, the purse structure will skyrocket to a estimated minimum of $2,700 at Foxboro Park in Massachusetts and Rockingham Park in New Hampshire will switch to a winter harness meet.

Those two giant moves could devastate the Maine racing industry. No track in Maine could compete against that kind of a purse structure.

Horsemen say they would be forced to go where the money is. It would certainly take the top classes of horses from Maine to compete elsewhere for more money. In this trickle-down analysis, that would force Scarborough Downs to raise the purses in order to recruit enough horses to field even a 10-race card.

Maine currently does not have enough available horses to fill its racing needs, but with purse accounts buoyed by OTB money, confidence in the horse business is beginning to turn that around. Maine horsemen are beginning to buy and raise more horses.

Traditionally, in the early going of Bangor Raceway’s extended meet, the horse supply is very tight, even with a large contingent of Canadian stables at Bangor.

Without enough horses to fill demands, it could kill northern Maine’s extended meet racing days and reduce, if not eliminate, Maine’s eight racing agricultural fairs.

Using figures from the 1996 Maine Harness Racing Commission’s annual report for Maine’s two extended race meets and 24 agricultural fairs, that in addition to the state losing more than $1 million to the General Fund, the Maine horse industry would lose most, if not all, of the following distributions generated in 1996 from combined harness racing and OTBs:

agricultural fair stipend, $764,039;

fair stipend, $56,679;

sire stakes stipend, $641,485;

promotional board, $162,409;

purse supplement, $1,324,959;

off-track betting simulcast, back to commercial tracks and agricultural fairs, $1,024,013.

There certainly is a moral issue for legislators to address, concerning additional gambling in Maine. Legislators must weigh the benefit to the industry and the state against all the other issues. It’s no secret that Gov. Angus King, and others, have voiced open opposition to additional gambling in the state.

There is also the fact that harness racing was enhanced when the Legislature authorized off-track wagering. And that legislation turned around the Maine horse racing industry.

Is video lottery another Band-Aid approach to the ailing Maine horse racing industry? Is the industry so ill that it will be back with another gambling bill in five years?

It’s not an easy choice for members of the 118th Legislature to make, but a choice must be made when legislation is introduced. Horsemen say the bottom line for them and racing fair operators is for the Legislature to not take an industry that has existed longer than any other organized sport in the country and lose it because no one was paying any attention outside the State House.

Elected to head their respective organizations as president in 1997 are: Joe Molnar of Richmond, Maine Harness Horsemen’s Association; Harold Billings of West Tremont, Downeast Harness Horsemen’s Association and Fred Lunt Jr. of Clinton, Maine Association of Agricultural Fairs.

Live harness racing begins at 7:30 p.m., Saturday at Foxboro Park in Massachusetts; March 1 at Scarborough Downs and May 31 at Bangor Raceway.