Live racing was popular at the Great Barrington Fairgrounds in the last century. [Photo: courtesy Fair Grounds Community Redevelopment Project]

There’s a new effort afoot to reestablish thoroughbred racing in the southern Berkshires, and the people behind the movement are coming to Beacon Hill with a legislative request to accommodate the new arrangement.

Sterling Suffolk Racecourse, which operates very limited racing at Suffolk Downs in East Boston, announced Wednesday that it has reached an agreement for a long-term lease of the racetrack property at the Great Barrington Fairgrounds. The agreement is with Fairgrounds Realty LLC and the Fair Grounds Community Redevelopment Project, the entities that own the fairgrounds.

According to Suffolk Downs, the track at Great Barrington first offered horse racing in 1859 and last offered pari-mutuel wagering in 1998. Plans call for repair and restoration work on the still-standing grandstand, barns and track facilities, and a potential expansion of the racing surface. Suffolk Downs said it is confident that it could begin some racing next year in Great Barrington and hopes to attract racing fans from New England and New York.

Chip Tuttle, COO of Sterling Suffolk Racecourse, said Suffolk Downs offered eight days of live racing last year in East Boston and plans to host six days this year, but possibly more in the fall. Great Barrington might offer a similar schedule in 2019, and more racing days in future years.

“Ultimately we’d like to get to 30 or 40 days a year of racing out there if the purse funding will support that,” he told the News Service.

“I love it,” Rep. William “Smitty” Pignatelli, who represents the southwestern Massachusetts House district, said Wednesday.

Describing the property as dormant for the past 20 years, Pignatelli said “it was really the place to be in the southern Berkshires when I was growing up.”

Bart Elsbach and Janet Elsbach of neighboring Sheffield purchased the 57-acre fairgrounds property in December 2012, according to Suffolk Downs, and created a nonprofit, the Fair Grounds Community Redevelopment Project, “with a vision to preserve and restore the environmental health of the site.”

“We are excited to enter into this partnership which offers potential benefits to so many people and organizations in our community, Western Mass. and the surrounding area,” Bart Elsbach said in a statement.

In a statement, Tuttle called the potential project a “very exciting opportunity for us to help preserve and refurbish an iconic property in the heart of the Berkshires, to boost economic development in Great Barrington, continue live racing and preserve hundreds of jobs, associated with agribusiness and working open spaces associated with the Massachusetts racing industry.”