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Legendary Racetrack Fuels Local Job Market
November 19, 2009 - 11:57 AM | by: Phil KeatingAnd they’re off! That is the horse racing declaration that begins every high-stakes horse race.
But right now what you hear at the Hialeah Park racetrack, in Hialeah, Fla., are the sounds of a major construction site.
Plumbers, carpenters, painters—you name it—are renovating this historic track for its grand reopening next Saturday. About 150 construction workers are on site, in double shifts, literally putting their sweat into making the deadline (it’s still 85 degrees here and sunny in South Florida this time of year.)
One thing Orlando Cebellos, general contractor with Link Construction Group, didn’t have a shortage of was willing labor. South Florida reaped the benefit of plenty of jobs back during the building boom years of ’05 and ’06, but when the housing bubble burst, combined with the financial crisis, new construction jobs dried up.
Nationally, the unemployment rate in the construction industry is a whopping 18.7%. That’s one in five construction workers currently not hammering, wiring or pouring concrete. But for those on the job hunt, Hialeah is the right place to be.
“I’m the luckiest man in South Florida. I have a job,” said Jeff Beck, who has the task of driving his tractor around the track, fine grinding up the dirt and rocks so that the horses don’t split their hooves.
The first phase of this $200 million project is a $12 million dollar investment just to get the park open enough to begin racing and betting. Then, over the next couple of years, the whole park will be reopened, along with casino-style gambling approved by the state legislature.
This makes Hialeah Park one of the steadiest construction job sites in Dade and Broward Counties. And the track’s trademark pink flamingos are still in the inside track, which gamblers will soon see as they watch the thoroughbreds sprint for the finish line
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