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JUDGES STAND I By Charles Hatton Chicagos Arlington Magnificent Park But Tax Threatens Turf as Sport in Illinois Diminishing Returns Follow High Take Figures in Crowded East Are a Warning Out here at Chicago they look ahead hopefully to another great summer turf season. It is one of the Arlington clubs customs to hold a sort of "open house" for the sports scribes a few days before each meeting. The meeting which begins here June 17 will be the first at the course on the fashionable North Side since 1942. We attended the "unveiling" of the track Sunday. We had heard that some improvements had been made, but were not prepared to find them on such an elaborate sale. Everything has been painted, there are concessions and mutuel windows on the mezzanines, new air-conditioned restaurants, remodeled lounges, tiers of new boxes that are already subscribed, an enlarged press box, and a suite of executive offices. The exclusive Post and Paddock Club has been entirely done over — and in the best taste. The , public is the first "lut not only concern. The horsemen will find | that the stables have been completely overhauled, the kitchen is i clean enough to suit the most fastidious, the grass course has newly banked turns, and Ben Jones tells "the main track is in perfect condition." These are all functional things. But the charm of Arlington, to our notion, is its spacious green lawns and wooded paddock. It is truly a park, much like Saratoga. We do not much care for racing "plants." Arlington is indeed a magnificent setting for sport among horses like Armed, Busher. Assault, Jet Pilot, First Flight and the rest of the nations turf favorites. But we could not help reflecting wryl that it is magnificent in somewhat the same manner as is a volcano — all very stately and serene on the surface, yet seething within. For the sport in the Chicago area is threatened by a tax which inevitably would reduce it to a leaky-roof character. We refer, jf course, to the proposed 4 ner cent additional "take," and we refer to it with a great deal of apprehension after having seen its effect in New York this spring. If this thing goes through it will end very badly for all parties concerned, and we mean by that the recipients will be hit by "the law of diminishing returns," along with the tracks. That is a mathematical certainty. If they have never heard of this law at Springfield, we are sure New Yorks mayor can explain it to them. When the subject of a city tax of 5 per cent on New York "tote" play was broached, this corner predicted that the play would decline, even in that area of 10,000,000 and about 50,000 new transients daily. Of course, this does not make us a prophet, for it would have been remarkable if it did not. The play at Belmont Park was off 5.57 per cent up to the last three days, which included Memorial Day and a Saturday. The play at nearby Narragansett Park, where the take is a normal 10 per cent, has gone up 24.84 per cent. So that the handle in New York is 30.41 per cent below what might have been expected. You may have one guess where a lot of this business is going. And you may have one guess what will befall Chicago racing if it goes off 30 per cent. At this point somebody is pretty sure to be reminded that Chicago tracks share of the take is 9.4 per cent of the "tote" turnover, whereas New Yorks is but 4.3. But its average mutuel play last year was ,215,552 at Arlington and Washington, its two leading tracks, and in New York the average was ,926,384. Not to mention that New Yorks revenue at the gate averages 5,000 daily more than it does here. It is only the tax method in Illinois and the willingness of a few progressive clubs to invest in their purses which enables Chicago to compete at all for the kind of horses it takes to present the kind of racing to which Chicagoans are entitled. "The power to tax is the power to destroy." It is one thing to help veterans relief, quite another to destroy an industry. People cant help wondering if the tax is really necessary, with all those millions spilling over the brim of the state budget, and. if it is, why the night clubs, theaters, ball parks and other amusements are not invited to contribute. There are all sorts of alternatives, but it seems that racing again has been singled out to be "the goat." The politicos in this state may not have stopped to consider the simple fact that racing is the most legal of sports and exists by popular vote of their constituents. The worst of these exorbitant track taxes is that when business over the country levels off, at it inevitably must, they are not going to be reduced to allow the sport to go on, for the revenue will then be needed more than it is now. Florida is the only state we know about in which a 15 per cent take is not particularly harmful under present conditions. And even under present conditions Keeneland could not have opened this spring had the 5 per cent bill at Frankfort been passed. The Florida take is a bad precedent. The legislators of other states are hard to convince that there is an important difference in the track crowds there and elsewhere in the country. A cheerful spender in Florida is a thrifty citizen when he returns north. That is how he can afford to winter in Florida. If the 4 per cent is levied in Illinois it will have a far-reaching and adverse influence in all the Middle West Chicago sport brings many of the horses here. It is no exaggeration to ~ay that the rich futurities and filly stakes would have to be abandoned sooner or later, and the values of Kentucky yearlings would decline. There is an old saying that applies to all games, "Take a little, and leave a little. It is very good advice.
