De Kamp, 071483 CAAGO, AGO 83-110

• Case Date: July 14, 1983
• Court: California

JOHN K. VAN DE KAMP Attorney General JOHN T. MURPHY Deputy Attorney General AGO 83-110 No. 83-110 California Attorney General Opinion Office of the Attorney General State of California July 14, 1983 THE CALIFORNIA HORSE RACING BOARD has requested our opinion on the following question:          Does the California Horse Racing Board have the statutory authority to authorize a California racing association to provide a live television transmission of a horse race from the association's inclosure to a racing association in another state where wagers on such racing event will be accepted by that out-of-state racing association at its facility?          CONCLUSION          The California Horse Racing Board does not have the statutory authority to authorize a California racing association to provide a live television transmission of a horse race from the association's inclosure to a racing association in another state where wagers on such racing event will be accepted by that out-of-state association at its facility.          ANALYSIS          In 65 Ops.Cal.Atty.Gen. 549, 550-551 (1982) we summarized the history of horse racing laws in California, and observed as follows:

"[T]he Horse Racing Law [Bus. & Prof. Code § 19400 et seq.] regulates in detail horse racing meetings, requires licensing of virtually all individuals and associations who have anything to do with such meetings, and provides for allocation of the 'take out' from parimutuel pools as between license fees, commissions to racing associations conducting the meetings, and purses. Until the enactment of chapter 186, Statutes of 1982 [Bus. & Prof. Code § 19596], parimutuel betting was permitted only with respect to horse races which were run in California, and only within the 'enclosure' or track where the race was conducted." (Fns. omitted.)

         We then noted that Business and Professions Code section 19596, as enacted in 1982, empowered the California Horse Racing Board (hereafter Board) to authorize an association conducting a racing meeting to accept wagers, within the track inclosure, on the results of certain out-of-state feature races1 if allowed by federal law and if the wagering were within 36 hours of the running of the out-of-state race. For such races the wagering authorized by section 19596 takes place at California tracks. In enacting this change the Legislature also provided for a separate pool of wagers on an out-of-state race and for the take out from that pool before the distribution of winnings to wagerers. (Bus. & Prof. Code, § 19616.)          The federal Interstate Horseracing Act (Pub.L. 95-515; 92 Stat. 1811; 15 U.S.C. §§ 3001-3007) regulates such interstate wagering on horse racing. Under this act an interstate off-track wager ("a legal wager placed or accepted in one State with respect to the outcome of a horserace taking place in another State") is lawful only if the racing association conducting the race ("host...