Smoldering again on the back burner

We know far more about the libidinous quirks and reckless sexual practices of the departed Eliot Spitzer and the adulterous history o his successor, David Paterson, and his wife than we imagined only a few weeks ago. What we don’t know is when the details of racing’s future will be settled amidst the smoldering ruins of the deposed administration and the uncertain stewardship of its replacement.

While there is no apparent titillation or potentially classic New York Post headlines in dealing with the still frayed loose ends of the racing franchise or the threatened closure of the New York City Off-Track Betting Corp., the long delayed process was set back again on Monday when Patrick Foye, downstate chairman of the Empire State Development Corp. and Spitzer’s liaison in negotiations with the New York Racing Association, resigned. Paterson has appointed a replacement, Avi Schick, but even with 10 busloads of NYC-OTB employees facing layoff notices in less than a month massed on the Capital steps on Tuesday, the new governor’s attention is riveted upon the annually late budget, and all racing issues have been relegated to the back burner. The question of awarding the right to operate the planned video lottery facility at Aqueduct, another integral part of the new law, remains among unattended issues that are the Spitzer legacy.

The usual suspects, Joe Bruno and Sheldon Silver, who have yet to name appointments to go along with three to be named by Paterson to the oversight board that was established by still incomplete legislation that awards the racing franchise to NYRA for the next quarter century, assured to OTB employees that all is well and that the issue will be addressed and rectified before they qualify for unemployment insurance, but that’s what politicians do. Meanwhile, all concerned move from one chaotic deadline to another.