Hubbard Names Slate for Hollywood Park Board

R.D. Hubbard, who is trying to wrest control of Hollywood Park from chief executive officer Marje Everett, has announced his 11 candidates for the board of directors at the track.

Should a proxy struggle develop, Hollywood Park shareholders would have to decide between Hubbard’s slate and the incumbent board in a vote that would be taken at the annual meeting Jan. 28.

Hubbard, a major partner in race tracks in Kansas and New Mexico, is trying to avoid a costly proxy fight by having Everett removed through board action, but he still lacks the votes to accomplish that. A proxy battle could cost each side--Hubbard and the track shareholders--an estimated $2 million.

The names of Hubbard’s board nominees were filed Wednesday with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Besides Hubbard, they include Harry Ornest, owner of the Toronto Argonauts of the Canadian Football League; Kjell Qvale, a San Francisco automobile dealer who is the former president of Golden Gate Fields; Bob Manfuso, former executive at the Pimlico and Laurel tracks in Maryland; film executive Howard W. Koch; F. Van Kasper, an investment banker from San Francisco; Dick Boushka, a partner with Hubbard in the Woodlands horse and greyhound tracks in Kansas; Herman Sarkowsky, a horse owner and breeder who formerly owned the Portland Trail Blazers and the Seattle Seahawks; Warren Williamson, chief executive officer of a securities firm; John Newman, a citrus-farming executive, and J.R. Johnson, president of a marine electronics manufacturing company.

Ornest, Williamson and Newman are already members of the Hollywood Park board. Their inclusion by Hubbard indicates that they are opposed to Everett’s regime.

Another Hollywood board member, Tom Gamel, is considered an Everett opponent. He was left off the Hubbard slate, sources say, to prevent the track’s shareholders from introducing a “poison pill,” an oft-used corporate tactic that helps shareholders resist a takeover by enabling them to buy stock at greatly reduced prices.

With 10 members, the Hollywood Park board is two short of the maximum. Besides her own vote, Everett has also been counting board members John Forsythe, Merv Griffin, Aaron Spelling, Allen Paulson and Bruce McNall for support. Hubbard would need two votes from that group to remove Everett without a proxy fight.