Sep 19 - Court Battle with Maxx Kelley
PRENTICE
Published: September 17th, 2011, Register-Pajaronian, Page 3
John Prentice, who runs Ocean Speedway, has been talking to folks all week long during the Santa Cruz County Fair, answering questions and receiving words of encouragement as the raceway looks to be headed toward a court battle with neighbors angry over noise and other issues.
Prentice took over the raceway in 2006 after the previous promoter, Rick Farren, wanted out of what Prentice described as a tough industry.
"Participation and attendance were down," Prentice said. "This is a difficult business . If you want to make a million dollars operating a race track, start with $2 million . We do it for the love of it; we do it for the charities we support. But I've never taken a paycheck in six years at this race track. Luckily, I have a beautiful wife that's very successful ." And he's fortunate, too, that she is a lawyer. Darlene Kemp represents her husband and the two have been able to spend some extra time together in fair board meetings, meetings with opposing lawyers and even during interviews with media. Prentice is also an automotive legal consultant, testifying in court in matters dealing with cars.
The number of races scheduled during the season was one of the earliest complaints from a group of neighbors led by Max Kelley. The group has since hired Santa Cruz attorney Gary Patton and calls itself the Community Alliance for Fairgrounds Accountability. Prentice had been scheduling more than the customary 30 races the season normally had, up to 36, but had stopped the policy of rescheduling rainouts. Due to CAFA's complaint, he cut back the number to 30 this year, but has lost one race to a rainout and is hoping he won't lose more before the season ends in October. One of the race days that was eliminated was the free race day during the fair.
Prentice feels Kelley and CAFA indicated there would be no lawsuit if he only scheduled 30, but they sued anyway.
"He went on record and said if I scheduled 30, he'd be happy, but he's not happy. That's frustrating ," Prentice said.
Prentice said CAFA's lawsuit doesn't target the speedway over noise issues, but instead challenged the validity of his contract with the fairgrounds , and that shows how little merit their complaints have. For instance, when Kelley claims the track was widened to allow for faster, louder cars, he's wrong.
"You can't widen it because the perimeter walls are the same walls that were there 60 years ago. The track has the same dimensions it has always had," Prentice said.
Prentice did make some safety improvements to the track when he took over. He got rid of the figure 8 races and planted grass in the infield to keep dust down. He also installed barriers on the turns. "I was a racer before I took over, so I knew what needed to be done to make it safer," he said. "But we race the same exact division of cars that the previous promoters raced. We've added no new divisions. There's not a single race here that was not here when we took it over."
Prentice also installed an electronic timing and scoring system that allows for much speedier results and, he says, an earlier finish to the night.
"We've shaved about an hour off the race night by just being able to run it more efficiently ," he said.
Other modifications have been made as well in efforts to make the races a bit quieter and a little less dusty. In fact, he said, some race fans have asked if the cars have suddenly been installed with mufflers .
"The cars always had mufflers on them," he said. "In fact, you lose power without a muffler because they prevent cold air from entering your exhaust."
Prentice said he feels Kelley, despite his claims that he likes the fairgrounds, is trying to shut it down. The speedway provides up to $100,000 in revenue each year for the fairgrounds and the loss of that money would be devastating.
"CAFA is trying to suck all the money out of the fairgrounds ," he said.
The track also gives a boost to the local economy. "It's huge," Prentice said. "There's 52 employees, and that's not counting the mechanics , the people who make the signs, the tire companies, wrecking yards, auto dealers " there's thousands of jobs that benefit in some way from this speedway. And it draws people from out the area to spend money here. There's only one sprint car team in Santa Cruz County, so whenever we have sprint car races, we have 25 teams, their families and friends, all in Watsonville spending money."
Prentice vowed to one day return the free race day to the annual fair and said there was no way he was going to give in to CAFA.
"We're going to fight it," Prentice said. "I've built my whole business on principle and this is just wrong. I'm a very reasonable person and I've shown that by cutting my races back."
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