Horse Rental Business Faces Unstable Future

The tale of Ralph Price’s efforts to keep his popular River Trails Riding Stables open has taken more twists than the plot of a grade-B Western.

He’s not renting out horses now, but Price--and city officials--still hope an insurance company will ride in on a white horse and write a happy ending to his story, in the form of a $1-million liability policy.

Price, like others using Norco city property for equestrian activities, learned that to continue his lease in River Trails Park he would have to meet Norco’s relatively new $1-million liability coverage requirement.

His insurance company wouldn’t increase his coverage from $500,000, so he allowed the policy to expire on May 1, Price said. “It would have been pretty stupid of me to pay $18,000 for coverage that Norco wasn’t accepting.”

As Price kept looking for an acceptable policy, the City Council on April 30 granted him an 11th-hour reprieve, giving him until July 29 to find the $1-million policy. He could keep the stables open, the council said, as long as he maintained his old $500,000 coverage for rentals and got $1 million in coverage for boarding horses at the park.

Since then, Price has been able to obtain a $1-million policy to protect his boarding business. He has been trying to obtain insurance for horse rentals.

And since he hasn’t been renting horses, city officials are threatening eviction, Price said.

The city maintains that “the purpose of the stables is for riding horses, not for boarding,” Parks and Recreation Director Ray Odell said Tuesday.

Without the riding stable, use of the 271-acre park is virtually shut off to people who do not own their own horses. When it was open, lines often formed on weekends as riders waited for mounts to explore a maze of trails winding through a bamboo forest in the Santa Ana River bottom.

Nationwide, liability insurance has grown increasingly expensive, if not unattainable, for many businesses, professionals and governments. In Norco, Odell said, it has also forced some horse show organizers to cancel their activities in the city’s Ingalls Park equestrian center.