Seaquist opposes ISC track deal, not NASCAR

Monday on The Morning Drive on Sirius NASCAR Radio (channel 128), hosts Marty Snider and David Poole spoke with Washington state Rep. Larry Seaquist about the debate regarding a possible International Speedway Corp. track near Bremerton, Wash.

Seaquist, who has voiced his opposition to the track, was quoted earlier as saying, "These people are not the kind of people you would want living next door to you. They'd be the ones with the junky cars in the front yard and would try to slip around the law."

Seaquist explained what he meant on the radio program:

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Rep. Larry Seaquist: I have never said a word against NASCAR fans. I've got voters in my district who are NASCAR fans. I grew up listening to car races myself on the radio. I was going after the International Speedway Corporation, the ISC. That's who I had in mind.

Now, it's my own fault I wasn't clear enough what I was saying and I apologize to anybody who did take offense but my concerns are solely about the track corporation and that's because they're trying to come out here, build a track, make a lot of money and leave the taxpayers in the dirt out here.

Marty Snider: Have you had this conversation with ISC themselves?

Seaquist: Absolutely. I've been on the record. We've been talking with [ISC vice president] Grant Lynch, [who] has testified before the committee. They've been here a couple of years working in the state. They got shot down up north of Seattle. The voters over here -- we're west of Seattle, across the Sound in a beautiful neighborhood -- generally the voters over here, while they like racing are very suspicious about the business end of this because we've been getting the shaft frankly on building sports facilities for privately owned corporations for quite awhile.

David Poole: Do you think the people that run International Speedway Corp. would have junky cars in their front yard, is that it?

Seaquist: No. I could have done a lot better at trying to say what I was trying to say but I was not after the fans at all. I said I used to like car racing myself. I grew up before the days of television listening to the Indianapolis 500. My first sports hero was a car driver.

But the issue out here is that we've got this rich ISC, it's a family owned business of billionaires, and they come out here and propose to build a track with paying no taxes. They've exempted themselves according to the deal they are offering us out here to not pay a cent in taxes. They take all the money off for themselves and leave us taking care of firefighting, all the other things that go with trying to support a track.

Poole: So it's the deal that you oppose, not the concept?

Seaquist: Absolutely. The whole deal out here is this track by this corporation. I'll tell you one piece of the deal that also left people very suspicious: The ISC, the Speedway Corporation, never promised, it's in writing, they do not promise to bring a race out here. They say they will try to bring a race which means that one of the other tracks that does have a NASCAR race is going to get the shaft because that race would be pulled here.

And that just leaves us, I'll give you an example: Everybody probably knows the Seattle Seahawks, the football people. The taxpayers of Washington state built them a new stadium. Over the next 25 years -- this is the testimony of the state treasurer, Mike Murphy -- over the next 25 years the taxpayers of this state will pay $595 million for that stadium and in return the owners will give us $25 million.

So the taxpayers are taking it in the shorts for half-a-billion dollars. So over here we look around and say, "Wow, looks like one more time we're going to the cleaners."

The Morning Drive airs weekdays (7-11 ET) exclusively on Sirius NASCAR Radio (channel 128). The show will re-air Monday night at 9 ET.