The US Grand Prix venue at Circuit of the Americas has been denied its annual funding from the State of Texas.
As part of its deal to host Formula 1, the circuit, which has welcomed the sport each year since 2012, receives around $20m from the local government to ensure the race remains financially viable.
However: “In this case, the law is clear that if a human trafficking prevention plan is not submitted 30 days prior to an event, reimbursement from the Major Events Fund cannot be issued,” a spokesman for the governor’s office told Austin publication The Statesman.
“The State of Texas and COTA have a productive partnership that has had a tremendous economic impact on the city of Austin and the state as a whole, and our office is already working with COTA on next year’s race.”
In response, COTA’s executive vice-president Rick Abbott tweeted a plan had already been put forward for the MotoGP race earlier in the year.
“The anti-trafficking plan was on file for other events throughout the year, so it is not a question of implementation,” he continued.
“In April of 2018, the Circuit of the Americas operations team developed a human trafficking plan to be included in the Emergency Action Plan (EAP) for the 2018 MotoGP Grand Prix of the Americas. That plan stayed in place throughout the entire 2018 race season.”
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Certainly, a loss of major funding would be a significant blow for COTA and may well lead to questions about the future of F1 at the track.
Abbott does believe a resolution can be reached though.
“As the reimbursement for the 2017 USGP was not paid until 10 months after the event, we remain hopeful the 2018 issues can be resolved,” he added.
