Businessmen Propose Takeover of Troubled L.A. Equestrian Center

A group of businessmen headed by a semi-retired Burbank banker has offered to purchase the lease on the financially troubled Los Angeles Equestrian Center in Griffith Park from Gibraltar Savings of Beverly Hills.

The banker, Gene Harmon, and officials from Gibraltar said the deal had not been completed and they refused to disclose details. But spokesmen for Gibraltar said the offer was less than the $10 million Gibraltar was seeking for a 50-year lease.

“We’re hopeful that the transaction will take place, and I’m even optimistic about it, but no deal has been made with them yet,” said Dean Harrison, general counsel for Gibraltar. “What we have now is a letter of intent. They could walk or we could walk.”

Even if a deal is worked out, participation by Harmon and his group would have to be approved by the Los Angeles Board of Recreation and Parks and the Los Angeles City Council. The center was built on Los Angeles city parkland. Most of the 73-acre complex is in Los Angeles, although the entrance is in Burbank.

Harrison said he hopes to have an agreement ironed out in time to present to the Recreation and Parks Board at their meeting Monday.

$2 Million in Debt

The center has been run by Gibraltar, the center’s largest creditor, since April, 1988, when Gibraltar foreclosed on J. Albert Garcia, the facility’s previous operator. The center is more than $2 million in debt.

Harrison has said the center is losing from $80,000 to $100,000 a month.

Harmon, 60, who said he has been involved in corporate banking for the last several years, said he has formed a group called Western Equestrian Centers. “We hope to continue it as the finest equestrian center in the United States,” he said.

Harmon said he plans to streamline the organization of the center, and that the group intends to make capital improvements. “We feel that we’ll be able to break even in a month or so,” he said.

The center has been controversial for several years.

Garcia and his financial backers filed a $200-million lawsuit, still pending, against the Los Angeles parks board, the city of Los Angeles and other Los Angeles officials, accusing the city of ruining Garcia’s plans to make the center profitable.

The Los Angeles Department of Animal Regulation earlier this year investigated the deaths of two ponies during a polo match in March.

Although center officials and polo players were cleared of wrongdoing, department officials said at least three injured polo ponies in the past year were inhumanely transported from the center to the Wildlife Waystation animal preserve in Little Tujunga Canyon, slaughtered and fed to bears, lions and tigers.