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- BUSINESS, Page 42They're Off And Kicking
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- The race for a famed track pits stars against tycoons
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- As proxy battles go, the fight for Hollywood Park racetrack
- ranks as a minor contest. But the cast of characters could have
- been plucked from the plot of a Dick Francis novel and plunked
- down in an episode of Dynasty. In fact, actor John Forsythe,
- the patriarch of the defunct TV show, is a star defender of
- Majorie Everett, the eccentric chairwoman of the company that
- manages the track in Inglewood, Calif.
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- Some stockholders charge that Everett, 69, has turned "the
- track of lakes and flowers" into a second-class operation. The
- main challenger is R.D. Hubbard, a Texas glassmaking mogul and
- owner of tracks in Kansas and New Mexico. Hubbard launched a
- proxy battle last November to gain control of the company's
- board and install new management, complaining that the company
- has lost $27 million in the past three years. Everett
- supporters like Merv Griffin counter that she has brought many
- innovations to the track, including simulcasting of events.
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- Hubbard hired private investigators who, he said, found
- evidence that Everett has misappropriated funds. According to
- one allegation, she supplied audiovisual gear at company
- expense to her friends Ronald and Nancy Reagan. Everett denies
- the charges. "They won't find a g.d. thing on me," she told the
- Wall Street Journal. Defending Everett's cause, Forsythe got
- into a shoving match at the track last month with an opposing
- director.
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- Hubbard, in his own poll of stockholders, gathered support
- from 49.4%, just shy of the majority he needs to take over. As
- a result, he will have to wait for an official count that will
- take place at the company's annual meeting Feb. 18. Tallyho!
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