A recent story in the Philadelphia Inquirer shines a bright light on the cruelty and corruption in Pennsylvania’s horse racing industry. This story reports that Parx Racing in Bensalem is on pace to surpass their 2019 horse fatalities, when Parx reported 59 dead horses—the highest number at any track in the nation that year. 

Incidentally, in May, a raid at Parx found dirty needles, syringes, drugs and other contraband in horse stalls and elsewhere in the back of the track..

Unfortunately, doping and dead racehorses are nothing new in the commonwealth. Racehorses are run into the ground: killed, crippled, and abandoned when they can no longer earn their keep. In Pennsylvania, 1,400 horses have died on racetracks since 2010. And thousands have been sent to auction houses, where used up racehorses are sold in bundles to be slaughtered in Canada or Mexico.

Yet, since 2004, the General Assembly has directed roughly $240 million in slots tax revenue to the horse racing industry each year—a total of $3.3 billion to date. 

About $200 million in annual subsidies go to cash payments to racehorse owners. At least half of the owners, according to the state Independent Fiscal Office, are from out of state — people who race horses as a hobby or invest in a horse syndicate as a tax shelter.

And while Pennsylvania has one of the most generous subsidies in the nation for the horseracing industry, it ranks near the bottom in support for higher education. In fact, the Commonwealth provides more funding, on average, to each racetrack than it provides to each university campus in the State System of Higher Education.

The Pennsylvania legislature has cut higher education funding per student by 33% since 2008, the sixth-largest cut of any state in the country.

And as the state legislature has shifted the cost of paying for college onto the shoulders of students and their families, tuition has become unaffordable for many young people, and Pennsylvania college graduates have been saddled with a debt load that ranks third highest in the nation.

It is past time for Pennsylvania lawmakers to straighten out their priorities and fund students over horse racing and horse cruelty.

Click HERE to register for a webinar on Monday, September 27^th at 7:00 pm to learn more about cruelty and death in PA’s racing industry and how you can join a growing movement to redirect funds away from the racing industry and into supporting higher education.

A poll in May  found that 83% of Pennsylvanians support redirecting $240 million tax dollars away from subsidizing the horseracing industry and using this money for other purposes. And 82% of people surveyed supported using some of these tax dollars to fund scholarships for students who attend Pennsylvania’s State System universities.

Our tax dollars should be invested in the future nurses, teachers and other professionals who will live in our communities, not in an industry that is rife with corruption and cruelty. I hope that you will be part of helping to make this happen!