Lift the Ban Watch: New York Edition

On the heels of the economic impact study that was presented yesterday, we receive word that New York State Assemblymen and members of the Arts, Tourism and Sports Development Committee will be presented with the findings by Marc Ratner himself. Notable quote:

The fight to legalize MMA in New York State gears up for round two on Wednesday, when legislators, regulators and promoters convene for an informational hearing in Manhattan.

The open-to-the-public session, spearheaded by New York Assemblyman Steven Englebright, will also be attended by members of the State Assembly’s Tourism, Arts, and Sports Development Committee, which voted down a bill last June to amend current legislation that bans the sport in the Empire State.

Englebright authored the bill that would have amended existing verbiage to allow for the New York State Athletic Commission to promulgate MMA regulations. Though the bill was met with both confusion and opposition last June and was ultimately shelved, there is hope a re-introduction of the bill in some form will pass through the committee this time when they begin their next fiscal session in January 2009.

New York is one of eight states remaining that has an athletic commission but does not regulate the sport, according to the UFC. The UFC cites 36 of the 44 states with athletic commissions currently recognize and regulate MMA.

Marc Ratner, vice president of regulatory affairs for the UFC, will be among the keynote speakers on Wednesday. Ratner, who served as executive director for Nevada State Athletic Commission for 14 years and was brought onboard to work exclusively on achieving regulation in the holdout states, will present the findings of an economic impact study solicited by the UFC to the tourism committee.

This is obviously good news, but one point needs to be made clear. I was on the conference call yesterday when Ratner and UFC rep Lawrence Epstein presented the results of the economic impact study to the press. One issue Ratner made clear was not a factor in getting MMA legalized in New York was an alleged dispute between Station Casinos and the UNITE HERE union. According to Ratner, that did not have any impact on the ongoing effort towards legalization and was merely an issue in Las Vegas. Ultimately that has to be good news because it returns the legalization battle to a matter of evidence and information, not political squabbling.