TUCSON, Ariz. – The Horseracing Integrity and Safety Authority wrapped up this year’s Global Symposium on Racing on Wednesday afternoon with a rapid-fire, no-nonsense 43-minute presentation that focused largely on the fine details of the implementation of its anti-doping and medication control program beginning Jan. 1. The panelists then opened the floor to questions. There weren’t any. The lack of questions reflected, in part, the bare-knuckled approach that HISA has adopted in the weeks since the U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals issued a ruling Nov. 18 declaring HISA’s enabling legislation unconstitutional. Rather than buckling or being cowed (and with several legal options still in play), HISA’s officials have put their heads down and focused on their work, and they have vowed that their new programs will be ready to roll out, in full, on Jan. 1, as scheduled. But the silence was, in many ways, unexpected. In the audience were several officials of organizations and racing commissions who were a party to the lawsuit that resulted in the Fifth Circuit ruling. None got up to challenge the HISA officials on their programs. In the minutes after the session broke up, several conference organizers wondered aloud about the lack of questions. Meanwhile, HISA officials acknowledged that the presentation was planned to wrap up well short of the allotted time so that they could address as many questions as possible before cocktail hour started at 5 p.m. HISA officials were certainly prepared for them. Since the start of registrations for the symposium on Monday morning, HISA had maintained a break-out room adjacent to the symposium’s auditoriums and invited all-comers to meet with them to address concerns or ask questions. The break-out room was busy for all three days, up to the final presentation on Wednesday. The dry-as-bones content of the final presentation contrasted with an aspirational address by HISA chief executive officer Lisa Lazarus on Tuesday morning to open the conference. In her address, Lazarus, a newcomer to Thoroughbred racing hired earlier this year, spoke about the need for the racing industry to unite behind HISA’s mission, in a tone that transmitted her belief that the fulfilment of HISA’s mission would mean a brighter future for the racing industry as a whole. :: Bet the races with a $200 First Deposit Match and FREE Formulator PPs! Join DRF Bets. But that message also was not completely neglected by the Wednesday afternoon closing panel. At the close of her presentation, Dr. Mary Scollay, the chief of science for the unit of HISA that will administer and enforce the anti-doping and medication control program, called for the racing industry to embrace the future that HISA represents. Scollay is one of several top-ranking HISA officials who have decades of experience in the racing industry. “Uniformity, we’ve all wanted it, we’ve wanted it for years,” she said. “This is our chance. It’s good for the horses, it’s good for the humans, it’s good for the industry, it’s good for our public persona. And I’m excited to be part of it.” Prior to that, Scollay’s portion of the HISA presentation entailed a detailed description of the changes that will occur Jan. 1 as the new anti-doping program kicks in, especially as it pertains to differences in how some medications will be regulated. Over the past several months, Scollay and other HISA officials have been talking regularly with regulatory veterinarians, private practitioners, and horsemen to educate them on how those changes will affect their practices. She asked racing licensees to take advantage of those efforts and to prepare themselves for Jan. 1 to avoid “honest mistakes.” “There’s no fun in catching a dolphin in a shark net,” she said. In his presentation, Ben Mosier, executive director of the anti-doping and medication control unit, which is called HIWU, outlined how medication and doping violations will be adjudicated under the new system. He stressed that HIWU investigators would work alongside state racing commission personnel to investigate violations. And he reminded the audience that under HISA’s new rules, alleged violators would be afforded a hearing within 60 days of notification, and that a ruling would be issued within 14 days of the hearing being held, no matter whether the violation involved a banned substance or a controlled medication. “That’s significant expediency across the board,” Mosier said, in a reference to racing’s current system, in which appeals of rulings can drag out adjudications for years. In her presentation, Kate Mittelstadt, HIWU’s chief of operations, took the audience through the steps that HISA is undertaking to prepare test-barn personnel for new protocols that will become effective Jan. 1. She also referenced the “efficiencies” that HIWU expects to realize by going to a paperless records system in the test barn. Furthermore, Mittelstadt stressed that HIWU officials are expected to oversee test-barn staff for the first “two or three days” of a live race meet to make sure that the protocols were working, and she said that HISA would work with states who are currently facing staffing shortages for key jobs that help to maintain the chain of custody for testing samples. “We appreciate that that is a challenge in many states right now,” Mittelstadt said. And that was that; the sesssion’s a wrap. All in all, pretty dry stuff. Any questions? Nope. The audience gave the panel a round of applause. But as the audience members began to stand up from their chairs, Scollay leaned back into her microphone. “Just one more thing,” she said. “It’s my goal to avoid mistakes, not to clean up after one happens. Let’s make sure we’re all working together to make sure this goes well.” No question about that. :: Want to learn more about handicapping and wagering? Check out DRF's Handicapping 101 and Wagering 101 pages.