Mick i love your work and the public do love Greyhound racing ....
its the Admins at present who insist on destroying this Industry from within ...

That crowd at Angle Park was terrific but who were they actually? Kids come along because their parents are occasional supporters. With a major attraction like the Cup those parents were motivated to have a night out, especially as it was a Friday followed by no work and no school. Good stuff. Much the same applied in Melbourne when Miata was on song and the Herald Sun ran big articles and photos.

However, that is an aberration. Over the last 10 years I have attended numerous meetings at 20 or so tracks in four states (as would many trainers). In the vast majority of cases I could count the members of the public on my fingers.

Second, even when some of the public are keen there is little incentive for them to attend the track when they can watch and bet from a local spot with plenty of facilities or options. I can't be critical of them because it's mostly what I do myself (and I live 15 minutes walk from a track). It's what it is.

Besides, why go to Wenty to risk a soaking in a southerly buster, or to The Meadows to stand at ground level looking over the flowers, or to Hobart or Cranbourne where the dogs are like ants in the far distance and everyone watches the monitors anyway (Hobart has one on every table).

Third, remember that during the NSW ban quite a lot of support for the industry was not prompted by any love of the greyhound but by a principled objection to the Premier's arbitrary and unacceptable behaviour is shutting down an industry - any industry.

Consequently, any reading from attendances is going to be misleading.

The more important point now is to address what those 949 people think. For the most part they have little genuine knowledge of the breed or the racing but they are voters. They know only what they hear (ie gossip) or read in the newspaper or on the ABC (ie only when something goes wrong).

Worse, that crook message is not countered by helpful stories from the industry - with exceptions for periodic displays by GAP or at the local shows. The public does not read formguides or greyhound blogs or articles on dog websites.

So if opinion-setters in the wider media say something it carries more weight than it should. That impacts on the 949 folk who end up with ... not a no opinion, but a negative opinion - or many of them do. My guess is that about two thirds of them have some sort of problem with greyhounds and greyhound racing. As I have said before, those attitudes are influenced by history, by media comment, by what their neighbour says, by mates in the pub - whatever. And nearly all of that will be negative.

To reach those 949 we need first to prepare our story, then plan the attack, then find some cash to put it into practice.

1. Publicise the Breed.
2. Sell the product.

PS: Billboards? I have put forward specific billboard proposals to three different racing authorities about what to do, what to put on it and where. None bothered to reply. None did anything.

One of your better posts

I have to agree with you, the advent of live TV racing has taken people away from the track

Not being at the track disengages the public from the dog and allows the negativity to be exploited

My contemporaries/myself all had their grounding by going to greyhound tracks as children

At those punting was not the motivation to go, but to see the greyhounds in action.

As a child I used to go to the parade ring and follow them all the way to boxes. I used to sit in the little stand at the home corner at Wenty above the old 530m boxes as I used to love to see them come of the boxes and also sweep around the home turn

From there grew the desire to participate as a trainer at 19 years of age after many dog meetings I attended whilst my father was a bookmaker at the TAB and city clubs.

Those kind of desires are not developed in children these days unless they are exposed directly in their own family with greyhounds or you happen to discover the sport in a positive hands on way as an adult

Lately I have known a few 50+ people to take up the collar and lead as a pastime for their later years, many years after being passive owners

What a time for them to be in the sport. They aren't being allowed to enjoy it anymore!!

You and Jamie are right

Its those 949 people out of 1000 that are being targeted to put greyhound racing in its hole for ever

It is that silent majority that saved us from Bairds errant actions but if our act is not brought together and positivity from our superiors is not apparent in not only welfare aspects but in helping the remaining participants to be involved in the game with commo sense rules rather than lofty and costly impositions then this game can be introduced to those 949 people as a viable alternative for them to be involved in a sport that is vibrant and exciting

Now I'm glad you used Miata as an example of what publicity can do.
That Herald Sun article, and story on Ch.9 of Miata meeting Black Caviar, is the reason I decided to go from syndicate shareholder, to owner/trainer. Before that I had no idea there was that sort of prizemoney available. One newspaper article was all it took for me to get into the sport.
Now here's a question Bruce, I'm sure you will know the answer.
What do the board do? For example, the GRV have a CEO, Racing manager, Chief Steward, etc, all with specific roles to fill in regards to administration and governance. But what do the board do?
Should advertising and promotion be part of their role?
And who appointed the board at GRV? Was it the members? I cant recall being asked to vote. I'm sure the GRSA members voted recently.
These are legit questions. I actually don't know.

Oh, and I can sympathise with your billboard ideas getting nil response.
I asked GRV to explore the possibility of having a treatment record book attached to our fasttrack account. Instead of pen and paper (20th century was 18 years ago) why not have it there with a drop down menu of all prescription medications, methods of administering, etc. Click, click, click, send, finished. It could be done while nominating or waiting for a boxdraw. And they could access it whenever they wanted. Instead, we have to get out the book and find a pen.
Best idea in history I thought.
But nah, not in their interests obviously. No point trying to simplify things for us.

Lots of questions there.

1. Directly and indirectly, some of the answers are on Authority websites. Others are in the enabling state Acts.

2. 1,200 happy customers is nice but hardly unusual. A concert would have more. Certainly a football match. A protest is different and will attract media scrutiny to determine if it is newsworthy in the view of the editor. The media thrives on conflict. So 24 people outside the MCG might get a run while 50 or 80 thousand inside may not. All of this is coloured by the values of the media outlet so the anti-greyhound ABC will give preference to the anti-greyhound view and downgrade or ignore supporters. For example, at the time of the live baiting saga the ABC recorded a 15 minutes interview with the GRV CEO but ran only a few seconds of it (fact!). Note (re Melbourne) that the Herald Sun will give greyhound racing a good run, The Age only a little, The Australian nothing - no fields no results (except when dramas occur).

3. All greyhound Acts include bits which call for the authority to develop and promote the industry, or words to that effect. Whether they do that or not is in the eye of the beholder.

4. (a) Voters appoint the government.
(b) The government appoints the racing minister (usually a junior member, or tacked on to other duties.
(c) The minister appoints the racing boards, who have total management responsibility.
(d) The boards appoint the CEO who has responsibility only as delegated by the board.
(e) The board and the CEO appoint other section managers.
(f) The CEO appoints various consultative committees from participants because it is broad government policy to do that in any area. This enables them to say we have consulted the people.

5. Your interesting point about medications etc sounds good if you say it quickly. However, it would require some extensive re-writing of Fasttrack code which will come at a cost in labour and complexity on a continuing basis. For example, a list of medications and treatment would be endless and possibly contentious given lots of brand names etc. My suggestion would be that someone could readily develop an app/program for individual purchase by trainers, of whom there are many thousands. That would include the ability to spit out a summary to supply to the authority if needed. It also offers a helpful record for the individual trainer.

Over-riding all these subjects is the fact that all racing authorities are structured in the same old-fashioned way. They revolve around management by committee which ensures mediocrity and use of the lowest common dominator. It confuses the use of authority and responsibility (see conflict between board and CEO versions of who did what about live baiting in the McHugh Commission). It ensures the continuation of bureaucratic behaviour, thereby reducing the incentive or ability to innovate. Or to look outside the square. The structure is a dud which is no longer followed by any major sports and certainly not by commercial organisations. It persists only because governments and racing ministers cannot be bothered reforming the industry. It is why virtually all codes in all states fought tooth and nail for years to ban newcomers like the NT corporate bookmakers (the much touted VLandys termed them parasites). And so on and so forth.

1. Publicise the Breed.
2. Sell the product.

PS: Billboards? I have put forward specific billboard proposals to three different racing authorities about what to do, what to put on it and where. None bothered to reply. None did anything."

You touched on the problem without explicitly stating it.

I know that the regulatory specifics differ from state to state, but in Victoria, the Racing Act prescribes GRV as the promoter and regulator of the industry.

(One might then assume that clubs run industry operations, though it increasingly appears that the operations of clubs are being diluted to being subservient agencies of the promoter/regulator, but that is probably off-subject).

Promotion continues to target the elite events, and seems also to be focused on community involvement via the clubs.

No problem with these in themselves, but as you say, there appears to be no holistic approach that targets the public in general.

Nor do a potentially serious breeding downturn, a downward trend in trainer renewals, and general negative perceptions at grass-roots level, seem to be being targeted for attention.

So until something is also done to restore confidence within the industry as well, the industry runs the risk of withering from the grass roots level up.

1. The role of the Board is overall governance of the organisation, including strategic planning. The CEO and management are accountable to the Board for operational performance.

Should advertising and promotion be part of their role?
2. The Racing Act specifies GRV as having responsibility for promotion and regulation of the industry (ie the scope excludes racing operations, but includes their regulation).

And who appointed the board at GRV? Was it the members? I cant recall being asked to vote. I'm sure the GRSA members voted recently.

3. The Board is appointed by the Racing Minister. As GRV is a public authority, Board members also have a responsibility to follow ministerial direction (problems can arise here when Directors face conflict between their governance/compliance responsibilities and ministerial direction as happened with the CFA).

A interesting aspect is that the GRV Board introduced a policy that no Board member or Board Sub-Committee member could have an interest in a greyhound to avoid any conflict of interest. This produces a Board that is bereft of industry experience - not a recipe for success in most industries. Normally a Conflict of Interest Policy would suffice, as occurs in Racing Victoria.

I asked GRV to explore the possibility of having a treatment record book attached to our fasttrack account. Instead of pen and paper (20th century was 18 years ago) why not have it there with a drop down menu of all prescription medications, methods of administering, etc. Click, click, click, send, finished. It could be done while nominating or waiting for a boxdraw. And they could access it whenever they wanted. Instead, we have to get out the book and find a pen.
Best idea in history I thought.
But nah, not in their interests obviously. No point trying to simplify things for us.

4. My understanding is that this will be considered in a major FastTrack upgrade that is being planned.

Replies above as numbered answers under each question.

The arithmetic says no with only minor exceptions for the odd effort in different states. Even then, many of those efforts emerged or were increased after the proverbial hit the fan - ie they were reactive rather than something board or management assessed was a good thing to do.

This can be summarised in the standard greyhound objective - which is to do what they did last year plus a bit. Strategic plans (required as standard procedure for semi-government instrumentalities) might say 5 years on the cover but are essentially waffle and feel-good statements. Hence the almost total lack of industry reform or even updating. Essentially we are doing today what we did in the 1950s plus a coat of paint here and there (although attention to drugs would be an exception).

There has been quite a lot of technical progress in the industry but it has come from organisations outside the reach of racing administrations - ie medicines, feeds, veterinary areas, transport and so on.

The issue of Ministerial direction is a problem. They often claim to be "at arm's length" but it seldom works that way when something critical occurs. That control can be sourced to the origins of the sport and betting, where taxes are such a major influence on racing policy (which is why the Treasurer is often more important than the Racing Minister).

But can you imagine a Minister trying to control what happens in AFL, NRL, Tennis or Cricket? Hardly, although lots of coordination and co-operation with government is needed. Yet those sports are today no different in practice (note Sports betting figures) except that they are structured not by an Act of Parliament but by the wishes of the participants - club, state, national, with some help from AIS. But not for racing.

As it happens, racing has tried to go down that road at times - eg club bosses on the state board - but it has proved a failure for a variety of reasons but mostly (a) the quality and lack of vision of the individuals involved and (b) perseverance with the deadening concept of management by committee.

In any case, activity on the board is always limited by the quality of the advice they get from management - more correctly termed the bureaucracy - which has really run things for decades. It's ingrained and even changing the incumbents doesn't help much as they are always caught by the system.

It's the system that has to change.

As for upgrading Fasttrack to handle drugs and injury treatment - I have my doubts. Existing state computer systems are already a big drain on resources, and sometimes a barrier to progress or change (whoever dreamed up the current GRV grading system could send a rocket to Mars).

The task in question is a small and linear one which could be handled more readily and more cheaply by a simple program rather than meshing it into a big and complex one.