Yorba Linda Horse Owners Win Vote : No Permit Required for Front-Yard Stalls, Despite Complaints

Citing a “low complaint level” and a disdain for “government interference into the everyday life” of its citizens, the Yorba Linda City Council on Monday rejected a proposal that would have required a horse owner to obtain a special permit and neighbors’ approval to keep a horse in the front yard.

The council considered enacting those requirements after residents of the 18000 block of Villa Terrace discovered that their neighbors, Jack and Ivy Hamlett, were building four horse stalls and a corral in their front yard.

Although the Hamletts’ plans were legal, their neighbors were irate. The neighbors claimed that the horses would be unsightly and feared that a flood control channel running through the front of the property could become contaminated with runoff from the horses’ urine. Led by the Hamletts’ neighbor, Bob P. Kennedy, residents petitioned the city for a law that would require people wishing to keep horses in the front yard to obtain a conditional use permit.

Such a permit, which would come from the city Planning Commission, could be issued only after residents living within 300 feet of the applicant’s property are notified by the city of the applicant’s request and the time and place of a public hearing on the matter.

The permit process, according to Yorba Linda Community Development Director Phil Paxton, would “allow the neighbors an opportunity to concur or object.”

Current city law does not allow horses to be kept in the front yard unless the lot setback meets a minimum depth. The Hamletts’ home--like their neighbors’--sits far back on a 222-foot-deep lot, with plenty of room in front of the house to meet the local requirements.

After receiving a petition from residents angry about the Hamletts’ front-yard stall, Planning Commission members agreed last month that they did not want an out-and-out ban on horses and other animals, such as cows and goats, in the city’s front yards.

But they could not agree on whether residents should have to apply for the use permits, so the issue was sent to the council for a decision Monday night.

“The interesting thing is that both sides are horse owners,” Paxton said. “It’s a question of how ‘horsy’ you should be. I don’t think either side is proposing to ban horses or do anything negative about them. It’s just a question of where on your lot you ought to keep them.”

Valerie Valardi-Davis told the audience of more than 100 at the council meeting Monday night that “horses are my life style and love.” But she added that it was equally important that Yorba Linda residents “keep the front of our property as desirable as possible.”

The vote was 3 to 1, with one abstention, against requiring the permit process for horse stalls. An elated Ivy Hamlett said: “Now people wanting to move to the community don’t have to fear that their neighbors can tell them what can be done with their property.”

While strangers and friends congratulated Hamlett, who moved to Yorba Linda from a Fullerton apartment in September, she clearly had bitter feelings about the whole experience.

“Had we any idea we would have found such resentment and hatred here, we would have looked elsewhere,” she said. “I happen to have fallen in love with the house.”

Voting against changing current law were Mayor Irwin Freid and council members Gene Wisner and Henry W. Wedaa. Ronald Bigonger voted in favor of the permit process, and councilman Todd Murphy abstained.