NYRA “Takes the Cake”
New York state comptroller Alan Hevesi blasted NYRA in a financial audit issued yesterday for violating NYRA and state rules in awarding contracts and said the organization had “mismanaged” and “squandered” money. Among Hevesi’s findings: that 38 out of 58 NYRA contracts were not competitively bid on, including one for almost $800,000 that was awarded to former chairman Barry Schwartz’s son-in-law for web services; that NYRA paid more than $400,000 in horse transport charges for board members and other thorougbred owners; and that invoices for services performed by contractors were missing. “The management was awful,” said Hevesi, although he took care to praise current management for their cooperation with the monitoring firm of Getnick & Getnick and the efforts made to reform the organization. (Blood-Horse)
The Times-Union reports that the biggest contract awarded without following procedure was ignored by the auditors.
In the wake of this latest bad news about NYRA, Paul Moran opines: “It has become painfully apparent in what are perhaps the darkest days that the racing game in New York has ever seen, that the New York Racing Association no longer works, that the partnership of racing and government is dysfunctional and that a wholesale restructuring that makes the operation of Belmont Park, Saratoga and Aqueduct a private enterprise is the only way to save the game.” (Newday)
