This week the owners of Les Bois Park, Treasure Valley Racing, announced they were pulling out of their lease on the Garden City horse racing track. With voters saying “no” to electronic betting terminals that could’ve subsidized the facility, the future of the track is uncertain.
With the defeat of Proposition 1, Treasure Valley Racing is making good on its pledge to back away from the 63 acre Les Bois Park.
The people who will ultimately decide what happens to the racetrack are the three Ada County Commissioners. One newly elected commissioner, Kendra Kenyon, tells KTVB she thinks had Prop 1 focused on bringing live racing back to the Treasure Valley and not been about gambling machines, voters might have been more receptive. The last time horses galloped around the track as spectators watched was 2015.
As for the next chapter at Les Bois, the incoming commissioner says she thinks the track – and the entire 240 acres that house the adjoining Ada County Fairgrounds – are the county’s most valuable and underutilized asset.
Once she and fellow incoming commissioner Diana Lachiando are seated in January, Kenyon says she’d like to see a report detailing the possibilities of the whole site.
For more local news, follow the KBSX newsroom on Twitter @KBSX915
Copyright 2018 Boise State Public Radio