In an effort to reform the state’s gambling industry, Florida is working on several fronts towards clarifying and changing most rules that govern betting in the Sunshine State. One section of attention is on pari-mutuel wagering: the betting that goes on at the state’s race tracks and frontons that are jai-alai hawaii. But industry insiders state that the first draft of guidelines that have been proposed by state regulators just will not work.

Workshop to Hammer Out Wagering Rules

Those rules will ultimately be discussed at a workshop with the Division of Pari-Mutuel Wagering on October 16, but were first released in a draft kind final week. The guidelines are made to stop a number that is growing of techniques that are obviously outside of what the state intends to allow at such venues. And even though a few of these new rules work, those in the industry say that many just show that regulators aren’t familiar sufficient with Florida’s gambling industry to help make such sweeping changes.

‘Some of them make sense,’ said Ken Stirling, executive director of the Florida Horsemen’s Benevolent and Protective Association. ‘ a number of them haven’t been thought out very well. One or two are pretty silly.’

One of the big areas covered in the draft rules is horse racing regulations designed to expel racing that is non-standard. Many in the industry agree that this is a good notion, as ‘barrel racing’ and ‘flag-drop’ racing happen seen by some operators in order to cheaply make payments that will also enable them to provide card spaces or slots alongside those races.

This new rules would help put a conclusion to such practices. They would bar ‘the racing animal to improve program in response to any hurdles in the racing surface’ and make sure that jockeys conform to uniform and fat requirements that couldn’t be a problem for legitimate racing operations.

Disagreement Over Acceptable Race Lengths

But the regulations don’t stop there, and this is where some feel that the rules go wrong. According to Stirling, some among these guidelines could devastate the racing industry if they aren’t changed.

As an example, the new regulations would require that all races are in minimum six furlongs in total a thing that might create sense if you’ve only seen the Triple Crown races or the Breeder’s Cup, but which makes no sense for the industry as a whole.

‘[The guideline that] no competition must be faster than…six furlongs…is a killer,’ Stirling said, noting that such races would be too long for two-year-old horses rushing within the summer. ‘That’s silly. We run baby races at 4.5 furlongs and we’ve been doing it for a hundred years. I know they truly are in Tallahassee, but we have these plain things called phones.’

He also objected to a rule that states that each and every competition must have at the least six horses a rule that could cause races to be canceled as a result of last minute scratches.

Jai-Alai would additionally be affected by the new regulations. For instance, each location could be needed to have eight certified players lucky nugget mobile in rotation. This rule comes in response to a debate at Ocala Poker and Jai-Alai, which began the 2012 season with only two players.

While there might be difficulties with the rules, division director Leon Biegalski says there shouldn’t be considered a nagging issue, and that the workshops are made to help iron out these issues because of the industry’s assistance.

‘They’re draft rules. They’re a point that is starting. You want to make sure that all the permit holders and all sorts of the stake holders are on the exact same web page in terms of just what the regulation is that’s out there and what ought to be out there,’ Biegalski stated.