With the stroke of a judge's pen, the race is on for an off-track betting parlor at Colonial Beach.
The contest features two mismatched contestants, a wide-open course, few rules, many uncertainties and an unknown outcome.
The local favorite seems to be Tom Flanagan, a longtime Colonial Beach businessman whose Riverboat OTB parlor on a pier in the Maryland waters of the Potomac River was wrecked last year by Hurricane Isabel.
Flanagan's opponent is Colonial Downs, Virginia's only parimutuel racetrack. The track in New Kent County is a subsidiary of Jacobs Entertainment Inc., a Colorado-based gambling enterprise with $245 million in assets.
Colonial Downs wants to open four new OTB sites in Virginia, including one in Westmoreland County, possibly within the town limits of Colonial Beach.
This week, Colonial Downs' workers gathered the last of 979 signatures, or 5 percent of the county voters registered Jan. 1 that state law requires for OTB referendums.
Yesterday, Circuit Judge Harry T. Taliaferro III signed an order to put the OTB question on the Westmoreland County ballot Nov. 2.
The stakes are economic, symbolic and high.
If Flanagan wins, Maryland will keep tax revenues from the Riverboat's OTB parlor, liquor store, restaurant, lottery and Keno operations, but Colonial Beach will regain a gambling pier that has been a waterfront landmark and tourist attraction for 50 years.
If Colonial Downs wins, Westmoreland County might earn $92,000 a year in new tax revenues and Virginia about $250,000, Colonial Downs President Ian Stewart said.
Fervent local politics in Colonial Beach, a town of 3,200, will undoubtedly influence the contest. Town Councilwoman Ann Congdon recently sent petitions signed by 3,000 residents and summer visitors urging Maryland Gov. Robert Erlich Jr. to help Flanagan rebuild.
"The value of the Riverboat transcends its economic and historical terms," Congdon wrote. "It is also defined by the personal relationships between Tom and Penny Flanagan and our community."
Stewart said last week that, among other possible OTB sites near Colonial Beach, he has looked at one in the center of town just a few blocks from where the Riverboat once stood. But Steward said the Colonial Plaza Shopping Center site "needs a little work."
Last year, the town issued a notice of violation to shopping-center owner Song S. Choe of Glen Dale, Md. The notice cited a leaking roof, cracks and holes in exterior walls, "severe disrepair" of the parking lot and other problems.
This summer, the Dollar General store moved out of the shopping center when Choe failed to fix leaks into electrical service panels, mechanical equipment and interior lights.
Stewart said he would specify a Westmoreland OTB site before the November referendum. If not in town, Stewart has said he would prefer a location near Colonial Beach in an area of the county closest to Fredericksburg.
Flanagan said he hopes to start rebuilding the Riverboat before November and to reopen his new OTB pier in time for the Kentucky Derby next May.
But the fast track Flanagan hopes to find may be too fast for the Maryland officials, who seem unlikely to approve Flanagan's plans before November.
And the Virginia attorney general's office is questioning Maryland's authority to issue Flanagan a permit.
Many water boundaries are set in the middle of rivers and streams, but Maryland's Potomac boundary is at the river's low-water mark on the Virginia shore.
This line on the beach made possible four slot-machine piers in the river at Colonial Beach that earned the town the nickname "the Las Vegas of the East Coast" in the 1950s. In that era, slot machines and liquor by the drink were legal in Maryland, but not in Virginia.
The Riverboat OTB parlor was built on the old Little Reno slot-machine pier that is technically in Charles County, Md. But the pier's parking lot and OTB satellite dishes are just a few steps away in Colonial Beach.
Last year, the U.S. Supreme Court granted Virginia the right to "construct improvements appurtenant to the Virginia shore of the Potomac River free of regulation by Maryland."
The opinion muddied the regulatory waters of Flanagan's application to rebuild the Riverboat.
"Maryland proposed that Mr. Flanagan get his permit from Maryland, but we couldn't agree to that because we think it is construction appurtenant to the Virginia shore," said Virginia Assistant Attorney General Frederick Fisher, who argued the commonwealth's case against Maryland before the Supreme Court.
Fisher said the two states have agreed to discuss the issue, but no meetings have been set and no agreements proposed.
Flanagan has proceeded with obtaining permits from Maryland. He filed site development plans in Charles County, Md., last month, but "the county won't do anything until the state does," he said.
Richard J. McIntire, a spokesman for the Maryland Department of the Environment, said the MDE would advertise Flanagan's Riverboat project for public comment later this month.
If any questions are raised, McIntire said, the MDE would hold a public hearing, probably in Colonial Beach. Following the hearing, the MDE will compile a recommendation that will go to the Maryland Board of Public Works for approval.
Another uncertainty in the OTB race between Flanagan and Colonial Downs is that OTB referendums in other Virginia localities may affect Colonial Down's decision to locate in Westmoreland County.
The track is seeking OTB referendums in five Virginia localities, including Westmoreland, for the four new OTB sites authorized this year by the General Assembly. With a projected annual $14 million "handle," or total bets placed, the Westmoreland site is the smallest of the track's proposed new OTB locations.
The biggest new OTB handle is the $90 million projected for the city of Manassas Park, where Colonial Downs narrowly lost a referendum in 1996. The other proposed OTB sites are in Henry, Greene and Scott counties.
If Colonial Downs wins all five referendums, will it build its smallest OTB parlor in Westmoreland?
"I don't know," Stewart said. "That's a problem I'd like to have, but it may be unrealistic to think that all five will pass."
To reach FRANK DELANO: 804/333-3834 delanobigtree@rivnet.net