Do Too Many Horses Spoil a Town?

For nearly three years, Rancho Palos Verdes has been debating how to solve an eyesore problem that has neighbors squabbling with neighbors, people packing City Council meetings and residents passing out leaflets and newsletters.

The eyesore? Horses.

The equestrian life has been a part of Rancho Palos Verdes even before the city was incorporated in 1973. For decades, people have kept horses in their backyards.

But now some residents are complaining that others are keeping too many horses or letting their horse facilities grow shabby.

The issue has been tied up in city government for three years. It has been discussed for more than a year at eight boisterous City Council meetings, including one gathering where 99 horse owners showed up.

“I don’t think there has been anything to parallel it,” said Mayor John McTaggert, who has been on the council for 13 years.

“It’s been quite a battle,” said Joel Rojas, the city’s principal planner.

The council began discussing changes to the city’s development code in November 1995. New laws could reduce the number of horses, goats, cows and sheep that residents are allowed to keep in the city’s four equestrian districts.

Those in favor of the status quo say, “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.”

Those pushing for change say there are too many horses, too much manure and too many flies.

Now, every developed or vacant lot can have as many as six horses on it. But the latest proposal would reduce that to three horses or other large livestock animals per developed lot. Anything above that would have to be approved by a new equestrian advisory committee of citizens appointed by the City Council. A special permit, costing some undetermined amount of money, would be granted after neighbors are allowed to sound off. Current horse owners might be grandfathered in.

The idea of a new horse code infuriates people such as Kay Bara, who lives on Villa Francesca, a 12-acre spread in the private and gated community of Portuguese Bend, where she boards 10 horses in metal corrals. Portuguese Bend has been the hot spot of discontent.

“There was a time when we were all friends,” she said while walking through the fields around the Mediterranean-style stucco buildings on her land. “But this has pitted neighbor against neighbor.”

Bara is now allowed to keep 18 horses because she has three lots. She can also keep other people’s horses if the money she charges is only for maintenance.

Under the new law, she would be allowed to have only three horses before getting permits because she has one developed lot and the two others are undeveloped.

Residents complain that Bara is operating a commercial operation because she boards horses for $250 a month.

They also grumble that the tin and wooden barns and hay piles covered with blue tarps that used to occupy her fields were an eyesore.

Neighbor Toni Deeble, whose house overlooks Bara’s land, likened the sight to Tobacco Row. Next door to Deeble’s house is an additional 10-horse operation. “Our deck became unusable because of flies,” Deeble said.

Robert Maxwell, another resident who overlooks Bara’s field, called it an eyesore that decreases property values. “This horse business has become excessive,” he said.

After numerous complaints, Bara spiffed up her operations, getting rid of the small barns and changing the tarps on the hay. Her horse corrals look neat and trim now.

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But neighbors still complain. They say horses boarded throughout Portuguese Bend create traffic on the rustic area’s narrow roads and the manure attracts flies. The horse opponents say they aren’t against three or four horses per lot but that anything more is excessive.

“It’s a residential neighborhood, and nobody needs more than three damn horses,” Deeble said.

But some see it differently. “This is not Beverly Hills, and I don’t want this to be Beverly Hills,” Bara said. “So we have a few neighbors who are disgruntled.”

The infighting in Portuguese Bend has left residents in the city’s three other equestrian districts upset. They have fewer problems in their neighborhoods because the lots are smaller and there are fewer boarded horses.

“This is a silly issue,” said Charlene O’Neil, a real estate agent who lives off of Palos Verdes Drive East. “We’re happy over here.”

O’Neil has 400 signatures from her neighbors asking the City Council not to change the code. “The whole thing is becoming a bureaucracy and taking people’s property rights away,” she said.

Although neighbors have argued about the new code for the past year, the end is near. On Tuesday, the City Council will study the grandfather clause. In January the code will be discussed at least one more time before being put to a vote.