The 154th annual Belmont Stakes will be run on Saturday, June 8, at Saratoga Race Course.

Saratoga Springs Mayor John Safford joins JoDee Kenney to discuss all of the preparations that have been done ahead of the race.

"Now we’re used to Travers, which is also a very big day, but for Belmont, 50,000 tickets have been sold," Safford said. "What’s great about the Saratoga Racetrack is it's so family friendly. And the one thing that will be pretty different is that no alcohol is going to be allowed inside. You can bring in a cooler, but you cannot bring in alcohol, where during our regular track season we do allow people to bring in. This is going to be very different. The beer venues are going to be a little different. They're going to be huge beer venues, so that they can, you know, easily support the number of people.... It's something new, but they've made it very clear. This is the Belmont; it runs on rules."

"In terms of preparing, I like to ask people if they were up for our Chowderfest, we have right up to 50,000 people in downtown Saratoga," he continued. "That is organized by Discover Saratoga, and one of the things that's really good about Saratoga is that we have organizations who over the years have stepped up to do things like this. So it is all on the Mayor's Office or City Hall to make these things happen. And we're very fortunate to have a group of people who are very good at putting these sorts of events together. They've been through this before, they're seasoned, and they're ready for this. And I'm ready for this. And I've worked with them, obviously, but I'm just always amazed at the high level of networking and cooperation...it's just amazing. We expect it to be huge. The one thing that we've noticed in the past is when we seem to advertise it is going to be crowded that stops people from coming. So we don't want to do that. Right? It'll be crowded, but we'll be able to handle those crowds. And we're very safe. And all the stores are gearing up to work for that. So, the economic impact is not just for Saratoga, obviously, when we talk about $50 million, we're talking about throughout the entire region. I mean, there's hotels that have been booked, Clifton Park and right down to Albany, Schenectady now for a long time. And it's going to, it's just going to be very exciting for the whole region."

You can watch the full interview in the video above. And be sure to tune in for a look inside the biggest issues impacting upstate New York, on In Focus — every Sunday on Spectrum News 1.