Churchill Downs made a major announcement that it plans to build a $200 million development in northern Kentucky with thoroughbred racing and up to 1,500 video slot machines they call historical racing. They’ve not yet applied for the license with the Kentucky Horse Racing Commission, but dangling such dollars before the commission will be hard to resist. Of course, we’ve seen this movie before in the far West Kentucky community of Oak Grove. They broke ground earlier this year with a similar development and similar promises. The problem is that there has been no legal process for such massive expansion of gambling. There has been no legislative hearing. No public input. No law to authorize new gambling expansion. Which truly makes Churchill’s announcement another case of getting the cart before the horse.