Lou Raffetto, New CEO of the National Steeplechase Association, visits LittleEverglades Ranch, home of the Mercedes-Benz Little Everglades Steeplechase
On Friday, May 16, Lou Raffetto made a trip to visit Sharon and Bob Blanchard at the Little Everglades Ranch in Dade City, Florida to discuss the possibility of the Little Everglades Steeplechase (LES) rejoining the sanctioning umbrella of the NSA.
In December of 2007, the Blanchard's pulled LES out of the NSA due to complications dealing with the NSA employees and different philosophies in management procedures.
Our recent visit with Mr. Raffetto was very pleasant and he was personable and fun to spend time with. While touring the ranch, Mr. Raffetto volunteered to open the gate to enter the steeplechase facility. With great difficulty and after several minutes of struggling, the gate was finally opened. We all had a good laugh when Mr. Raffetto remarked that he had a college degree and it should have been an easy task to open the gate.
After a brief tour of the steeplechase facility, the negotiations began. Different areas of concern were discussed such as: the NSA not divulging financial records, the differences in the philosophy of running an organization, the differences in having a steeplechase versus a point to point meet and fmally the real concern was revealed. Mr. Raffetto said that the NSA had worked with the Maryland Racing Commission to make sure that horses that ran at our race meet and the Queen's Cup race meet would be allowed to run at Fair Hills, a track with pari-mutuel gambling. This could be a concern at other pari-mutual tracks also. The concern was that they may not be as successful next year if we are not sanctioned.
Didn't the NSA create this problem by contacting the Maryland Racing Commission to begin with? At this time, we all agreed that we would NOT become sanctioned for now and that we have the rest of 2008 to think about our formal decision.
We have 3 options:
- We can run our race meet as before and contact Equibase to have the races charted. We are in the process of exploring if this is a feasible option.
- We can run our race meet as a point to point and not have drug testing, a photo finish camera or credited officials and lower our purses. This is beyond us. Wouldn't you think the NSA would want to make sure that any point to point or steeplechase would make a concerted effort to uphold the utmost in professionalism since we are representing the sport, sanctioned or not?
- And finally, we can close our gates and not have the LES again.
Yes, you are right, we did not mention coming back to the NSA as one of our options. Until we see positive change in the NSA's organization and practices, there will not be a fourth option.
It is up to the NSA, as to which option that LES will take. The ball is in their court and we hope that the board will make sure that there is fairness and integrity guiding the NSA.