Iowa Greyhound Park to open for final season on Saturday

DUBUQUE, Iowa (KCRG) – This weekend will mark the beginning of the ultimate season for the Iowa Greyhound Park in Dubuque. The park is one in all solely 4 greyhound racing parks within the nation.

As he ready to open the park one ultimate time, Brian Carpenter, the park’s common supervisor, mentioned it was a “bittersweet feeling.”

”Everyone is worked up about one other season of reside greyhound racing beginning, however, clearly, we’re all just a little disenchanted this being the final yr,” he talked about.

Carpenter, who has labored on the Iowa Greyhound Park for 37 years, mentioned the closure follows a development of different greyhound parks shutting down throughout the nation. That development began when Florida banned greyhound racing in 2020.

”They (Florida) had been the main focus for therefore many tracks down there that everyone can breed, have the ability to ship canine to completely different locations, however once they closed down, a number of breeders stopped breeding, so now it has form of grow to be a scarcity,” he defined.

And with fewer canine, Carpenter mentioned it’s not financially possible to maintain the park, which at the moment employs 56 folks, operating. At the moment solely three states have energetic tracks, and all however West Virginia are phasing them out.

”We have now positively introduced plenty of tourism into the city from outdoors of the state,” he added. “One thing completely different. Not too many different amenities have one thing like greyhound racing.”

The shortened 2022 season will start on Saturday, March 16 and can run by way of Sunday, Could 15. It can additionally mark the primary time in years the place the park will host races on Easter Day.

For this ultimate season, Carpenter mentioned they’re anticipating to see previous buddies and even new followers are available for a final goodbye.

”We’re getting plenty of telephone calls from previous staff, previous gamers, every little thing else wanting to come back again one final time and we hope to see plenty of large crowds this yr for the entire month,” he commented.

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