Supreme Ventures Racing and Entertainment Limited (SVREL) is now in the process of restructuring and consolidating its operational activities and procedures as the sole promoter of horse racing in Jamaica.

SVREL, a wholly owned subsidiary of Supreme Ventures Limited (SVL), took over the reins on March 7 of this year after SVL was chosen as the entity to promote racing by the Government following lengthy divestment procedures, and yesterday announced that, after six months in charge and after a detailed operational assessment, it will be retaining 321 of its 340 employees.

A release yesterday from SVREL stated that those employees retained will be placed on full time or freelance contracts.

“Our aim was to be as thorough as possible, while being as sensitive as we could. Over the period we were able to closely look at roles and responsibilities in each area to determine how to effect changes that would yield the desired operational results. At the end of the day we are happy to be able to retain the majority of our team,” said Paul Hoo, chairman of both SVL and SVREL.

Hoo said that, based on the assessment done in the last six months, there were clear cases of overlapping of efforts and that changes were inevitable in order to create greater efficiencies.

“There was some overlapping incurred by the consolidation, and in an effort to be more efficient, some separation was necessary. We, however, would like to thank every single team member who made a contribution over the last six months,” the SVL chairman stated.

The areas most impacted by the separation are the finance and property departments. Some employees retained in the Finance Department will be absorbed by Prime Sports Jamaica Limited, which is another subsidiary of the Supreme Ventures Group, while some functions within the Property Department will be outsourced to Manpower & Maintenance Services Limited.

The Jamaica Observer understands that television/video coverage of race days will be outsourced to a leading provider with a number of current freelancers moving from SVREL to this company, which was not named.

A number of staff meetings involving the management of SVREL and the various department have been taking place since Tuesday with a general staff meeting planned for this morning.