Sinai Hospital of Baltimore wa

Sinai Hospital of Baltimore is offering more than $2 million to buy approximately 18 acres adjacent to Pimlico Race Course, and said if it can't reach a deal to buy the property by the end of the year, it will have to spend up to four times as much to build a new parking garage for its growing employee base.

Negotiations were halted for more than a year after Pimlico's owner declared bankruptcy. But a hospital administrator said Thursday that Sinai can't hold out much longer to work out a deal with Pimlico's new owner, MI Developments Inc.

"We're concerned because the longer this goes on the more we have to bite the bullet and spend very scarce dollars on parking garages," said Martha Nathanson, vice president of government relations and advocacy for LifeBridge Health, which owns the hospital. "We'd rather spend $20 million on a health care facility that can do a lot of good, than Replica Omega Watches a parking lot ... which is more of a necessary evil."

Sinai has been leasing the land for satellite parking for the better part of the last decade and is offering Ontario-based MID $2.15 million. The lot holds up to 800 cars, and Nathanson estimates that a parking garage of similar capacity would cost $8 million, or $10,000 per space.

Sinai would continue its agreement with the track that it free up the land prior to major weekend events like the Preakness Stakes or concerts.

In late 2008, the hospital had reached a verbal agreement with the former owner, Magna Entertainment Corp. In March 2009, the company declared bankruptcy. MID is the parent company of Magna.

CEO Dennis Mills said MID was open to talking but did not wholesale lingerie want to make any decisions about its Maryland tracks until a court battle in Anne Arundel over slots is resolved. The Maryland Jockey Club (a MID subsidiary) and several anti-slots citizens groups are trying to block a slots casino development near the Arundel Mills mall. MID and the jockey club fear a competing gambling facility would kill business at Laurel Park and want slots at the track instead.

The Maryland Court of Appeals is scheduled to hear arguments on the case July 20.

Replica Omega Watches Mills said the case wouldn't impede negotiations but MID would not be ready to commit to anything regarding its Maryland properties until Laurel's slots future was decided. MID also owns tracks in Florida, California and Oregon.

"There's journey to get to the result -- it's just the final decisions are not happening until then," Mills said. "We are hoping that the gaming experience will be at Laurel ... but we don't want to make piecemeal decisions, we want to make comprehensive decisions."

The Court of Appeals is expected to rule on the case before the Aug. 16 deadline to add a voter referendum regarding the casino's zoning to the ballot in Anne Arundel County.

Nathanson said Sinai, which is expanding its orthopedic department and in the planning stages of creating an institute for aging, would need an agreement from MID before the end of the year. The hospital and its associated Levindale Hebrew Geriatric Center employ a total of 5,400 people.

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