Dear Editor:
As a participant of standardbred racing I find it appalling the unjust treatment of the standardbred industry by the Sask Party which is unprecedented by any other government.
I have been a owner, trainer, driver for more than 20 years and through those years I spent $250 on fuel, approximately $100 on hotels, $50-100 in the restaurants per race day. If there were 15 days of racing in Yorkton I alone spent $6750-$7500 per year to race in Yorkton.
I drove from Swift current every week with only two horses and would spend $60 per week on prepared feed from mid March pre-training to mid September, in total about 24 weeks totalling $1440. Also between $2000 and $4000 on vet services, fuel, supplies and services to care for my horses the rest of the year in the premiers home riding.
My horses do pretty well with the purses in Saskatchewan but I don't make back the more than $10,000 that I spend per year and with a $200,000 government grant I put more than five per cent of that $200,000 back into the Yorkton and Swift Current economies myself. Other participants must buy all their feed and pay more vet fees than I do. I believe it would be in the present governments best interest to reconsider the harness racing grant as harness racing is a vital industry for participating cities and the agriculture industry in Saskatchewan.
Kevin Siever
Tax payer, land owner, horse trainer,
Swift Current, SK.
