Told to Move : Summa Corp. Putting Whip, Spur to Stables

The Playa del Rey Stables, ordered off its Culver Boulevard location more than three years ago, will not get another reprieve and must move by July 31, according to a representative of the Summa Corp., which owns the 7-acre site.

Some owners of the 100 horses at the stables say they may have to destroy their animals if new stable space cannot be found.

Search for Land

Stable owner Bob Harvey has managed to win five reprieves since February, 1985, when Summa first ordered him to move his stables off the site, which it has occupied for 77 years. But a Summa representative said time is running out for the stables.

“I am sure Mr. Harvey is hoping for another extension,” said Summa’s Christine Henry. “We have been trying to impress upon him that this is not going to be the case and he should seek another site.”

But Harvey said he has not been able to find a new site for his business.

“I’ve always asked that we be given the chance to get some other land in the area,” he said. “But there is no land available at present.”

Henry said Summa plans to build 225 housing units for low-income senior citizens on the site. The project should receive approval from the City of Los Angeles sometime in 1989.

“We have determined that the time has come to clear the land,” she said.

“We kept giving extensions because relocating a horse is not the easiest thing in the world, and we wanted to give people time,” Henry said. She said it was assumed that most people would eventually move their horses out of the stable. Instead, she said, “a few people left but more came in.”

But Harvey maintains that if Summa is not planning to use the site this year, he should be given more time.

“All I’m saying is that I don’t think they are going to use the land immediately, and they are premature in kicking out the only stables that are accessible to the community,” he said.

In the meantime, Harvey will continue to look for a new site.

“If I could get a decent lease, I could spend the money to do the rest,” he said.

If no alternative sites are available and the stables were closed, “some horses would have to be put down (destroyed), the ones that are old and blind,” Harvey said.

He said there is a shortage of stables in the Los Angeles area.

Having an affordable stable nearby is the only way Mariko Wilson has managed to own a horse, she said. She pays $160 a month to board her horse, a lame racehorse she bought for $1. With daily care, she has managed to nurse it back to health.

“I knew the stables were on an extended lease,” she said. “But I thought the possibility of eviction was far in the future.

“Now I have no idea what I am going to do. This is the only stables out here,” she said.

And because her horse had been injured, it is very unlikely that she would be able to find someone to buy it or adopt it, Wilson said.

“I would hate to have him put down. But he has a bad leg, and nobody would buy him,” she said.

Harvey is marshaling public support in favor of another reprieve from Summa.

He is passing out “Save Our Stables” bumper stickers and has petitions with what he said are 2,200 signatures in support of his position. Harvey will hold a public open house on Saturday at the stables, 315 Culver Blvd., behind the White Feather restaurant. He hopes area politicians will attend.

“Here we have a horse stable that has been here 77 years and 100 people who have absolutely no place else to go,” Harvey said.

Summa’s Henry said: “I will admit it is not easy to find land for that kind of use in an area as urban as West Los Angeles.”

But “there is no future for the stables” on its present site, she said.