Score One For Man's Best Friend

By Jessica Scarpati

An observer who had only watched the tallies come in from Bristol and Plymouth counties on Tuesday night could’ve been certain dog racing would survive.

Southeastern Massachusetts was the biggest stronghold to keep dog racing intact, voting by wide margins in opposition of Question 3, which makes dog racing illegal by January 2010.

But it was the remaining 299 cities and towns in the state that decided the fate of the state’s two dog tracks — some communities vehemently so, such as 97 percent of voters in New Marlborough, a town of about 1,200 in Berkshire County, who voted to end dog racing.

Ultimately, 56 percent of voters across the state voted to end the sport, effectively shutting down tracks in Raynham and Revere.

According to one expert, the voting breakdown suggests the tracks secured their support from their stakeholders — those who would suffer from its losses — or those who felt a solidarity with its blue-collar roots.

“People from a different class, who would be professional or higher-level income, are not likely participants in dog tracks,” said Michael Kryzanek, a political science professor at Bridgewater State College.

“I think there’s also probably a greater appreciation of the economic impact of the dog track (in this region) than there might be in other communities,” he said.

Thinner margins — but still supportive of racing — prevailed in blue-collar communities around Revere’s Wonderland Greyhound Park, such as Everett, Lynn and Saugus.

But every other region — Greater Boston, the Cape and the Islands, the North Shore, MetroWest, Central Massachusetts and the Berkshires — all came down on the side of the racing opponents.

“They worked harder and they were more aggressive,” Kryzanek said of the Committee to Protect Dogs, the group behind the ballot initiative. “Give them credit — they wanted it more.”

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