What to Know
- In a letter to a federal judge on Tuesday, Cherry Hill Towne Center Partners said it ants to voluntarily dismiss its lawsuit against a successor to the company that ran the former Garden State Park in Cherry Hill.
- The two parties have been embroiled in a legal dispute over whether a 21-year-old document gives GS Park Racing and affiliated companies the exclusive right to offer sports gambling.
- New Jersey law allows casinos and current and former racetracks to operate sportsbooks.
A developer is dropping a bid to offer sports gambling at the site of a former South Jersey racetrack.
In a letter to a federal judge on Tuesday, Cherry Hill Towne Center Partners said it wants to voluntarily dismiss its lawsuit against GS Park Racing and affiliated companies, the successor to the company that ran Garden State Park in Cherry Hill, where horse racing was last held in 2001.
The developer owns most of the property and has redeveloped it as a retail center. It has sought to build a sportsbook there to capitalize on New Jersey's lucrative sports gambling industry. State law allows casinos and current and former racetracks to offer sports betting.
Get Philly local news, weather forecasts, sports and entertainment stories to your inbox. Sign up for NBC Philadelphia newsletters.
The two parties have been embroiled in a legal dispute over whether a 1999 document gives GS Park Racing the exclusive right to offer sports gambling. A co-defendant, Greenwood Racing, operates the Parx casino and racetrack north of Philadelphia.
Last fall, the judge ruled the document is enforceable but stopped short of issuing a preliminary injunction against the developer.
Since the Supreme Court overturned a federal ban on sports betting two years ago, New Jersey gamblers have wagered more than $7 billion, second-most in the country behind Nevada.
