Deal Keeps Arlington Park Open : Horse racing: Racing days reduced from 130 to 55 while rival tracks get extra dates, promise help.

The Illinois Racing Board on Tuesday approved a deal by Chicago-area track owners that will keep Arlington International Race Course open while limiting racing days in Illinois.

Under the pact agreed to by Chicago-area track owners, Arlington will race 55 days instead of its usual 130. Sportsman’s Park dates will jump from 73 to 90 and Hawthorne’s from 73 to 84. Facing a possible shortage of horses, the tracks will race five days a week instead of the previous six.

In addition, owners of Sportsman’s Park and Hawthorne said that if Arlington’s daily handle doesn’t generate its 1994 level of $190,000 a day in purses, they will make up the difference.

The 8-1 vote in favor of the plan ends a monthslong saga that included Arlington owner Richard Duchossois threatening to shutter his track in 1995 unless the state gave him a riverboat casino license. He complained that he can’t compete against the Elgin riverboat, which docks only 12 miles from his track. He was projecting losses at Arlington as high as $6 million because of competition from the riverboat.

Horse racing is a $1.3 billion industry in Illinois, with about 25,000 people breeding, training and racing horses. About 12,000 people work in related jobs. Arlington generates 4,500 jobs in Arlington Heights and supports other jobs in related businesses elsewhere in the state.

Owners from Arlington, Balmoral Park, Maywood Park, Sportsman’s Park in Chicago and Hawthorne in Stickney told racing board members that business siphoned off to casinos has caused purses to shrink. That, they say, sent the best horses out of state, where wagering is higher.

Owners promised to stick together to lobby state lawmakers for reforms of the state’s racing laws and for a jointly held riverboat casino license.

“That will be on our Christmas list. Absolutely,” said Charles “Stormy” Bidwill, owner of Sportsman’s Park.

Said Duchossois, “Everything is competitive with everything else under the proper conditions, and what we’re endeavoring to do is get those conditions so we have a level playing field.”

Duchossois had estimated his daily purse would dip as low as $100,000 with the Elgin riverboat, which opened this fall.

Hawthorne and Sportsman’s Park would subsidize Duchossois’ operation because “the demise of Arlington would be swiftly followed by the demise of Hawthorne, Sportsman’s, Balmoral and Maywood,” Bidwill said.