A three-year legal delay around the sale of Dunudin’s Forbury Park has finally been resolved. Harness Racing NZ has reached a settlement with SEED Housing. The final details are confidential, but the settlement paves the way for Harness Racing NZ to put the site on the market. The good news comes just in time for Christmas.
The Why of It
Forbury Park will be sold after a long legal battle between the Forbury Park Trotting Club (FPTC), SEED Housing Limited and Harness Racing New Zealand. The former Dunedin racecourse stopped operating in July 2021 due to financial issues and low public interest. Members of the industry also agreed that Forbury Park was not accommodating the interests of racing enthusiasts in the area.
The final race meet was held there in July of 2021 and community consultation followed. Community housing, sports playing fields and flood management were put forward as top uses for the twelve-hectare park. The 110-year-old track, that filled the lives of so many over the previous century, would finally be able to be part of its local horse racing community again.
SEED Housing, a social enterprise, had first attempted to purchase part of the land from the club in 2019. SEED’s mission is to build resilient and affordable housing. However, the deal was challenged by Harness Racing NZ. It claimed that it had the right to veto the sale under the new Racing Industry Act 2020. The Act had come into force just after SEED and the FPTC had come to an initial agreement.
Under the new Act, Harness Racing NZ now had the ability to veto the sale. The FPTC was registered with them and had to get consent to sell off part of its land. Controversy surrounded the now contested sale. The FPTC had been looking forward to putting the funds from the sale into the lagging club to revitalize it and bring it up to new heights.
Harness Racing NZ wanted to shut down the club and racecourse, sell the entirety of it off, and redistribute the funds from the sale to elsewhere in the country. The FPTC felt betrayed. Craig Paddon, chairman of the Forbury Park Trotting Club was vocal about his views on the matter.
“You can’t help but think the code has decided to shut Forbury down, get the money and spend it elsewhere, and when I say elsewhere, possibly Southland and at Addington in Christchurch.”
Other board members of the FPTC hoped that Harness Racing NZ would decide to build a new raceway nearby, outside of but close to Dunedin. Forbury Park was the Southern-most racecourse in New Zealand. Members were worried that the more populous and popular Addington Raceway in Christchurch, also on the South Island, would absorb the funds instead.
Now that the court case with SEED Housing is over, Harness Racing NZ is proceeding with the sale of part of the original twelve hectares. During the three-year legal battle, the Ministry of Education had purchased part of the land for a school expansion. After that sale was completed, mere months passed before the legal issues between SEED and Harness Racing NZ disappeared and a High Court decision was finally made.
SEED Housing won and their caveat over the land is allowed to be kept. Harness Racing NZ is now also clear to sell the remainder of the land. Lower South Island harness racing aficionados have their fingers crossed that the sale will benefit harness racing in the south. Local town planners and environmental managers are hoping that part of the land will be purchased by Dunedin City or Regional Council for floodplain management.
We can all only wait and see what Harness Racing New Zealand will do with the funds.
