JOIN US in emailing the following Demand to initiate suspension of the deadly Los Alamitos Race Meeting — preferably today, Wednesday, November 26th by 3pm, or as soon thereafter as you are able, given the Thanksgiving holiday weekend. Please Share this email template via direct email message, other private message and/or private social media group.
TO: Gregory Ferraro, CHRB Chair, walkindog1@gmail.com
Oscar Gonzales, CHRB Vice Chair, oscargonzalesjr@gmail.com
Scott Chaney, CHRB Executive Director, cschaney@chrb.ca.govCc:
CC: information@chrb.ca.gov
SUBJ: Demand to Initiate CHRB 1435 Suspension of Los Alamitos Race License
Just over 5 years ago, our California Legislature voted unanimously to give the CA Horse Racing Board (CHRB) the authority under CHRB Rule 1435 to suspend racing to protect horses and/or humans, and Governor Newsom signed SB 469 into law soon thereafter.
So far this year, 29 horses have died at the Los Alamitos Racetrack in Cypress, Orange County. REMEMBER, when the Santa Anita Park Racetrack hit 29 fatalities in June 2019, after two horses died in three days, the CHRB asked Santa Anita to end that six-month race meet two weeks early, which Santa Anita refused to do, and which prompted the new law giving the CHRB the power to suspend a racing license.
This past Sunday, THREE 2-YEAR-OLD QUARTER HORSES DIED IN THREE RACES at Los Alamitos Racetrack.
On all CA Racetracks so far in 2025, 60 horses have died.
WHAT is the CHRB waiting for? I call upon the Executive Director or the Equine Medical Director to file the Petition prescribed in CHRB Rule 1435 to initiate the process to suspend the Racing License of the Los Alamitos Quarter Horse Race Meeting, due to the foregoing deaths of horses this year in said Meet.
“(l) A petition for an order suspending a license to conduct a racing meeting or imposing license restrictions may be filed by the Executive Director or their designee, or by the Equine Medical Director of the Board.”
Los Alamitos Race Course has had over five years since the CHRB first used Rule 1435 in July 2020 to consider suspending its Racing License due to excessive horse deaths, was placed on ten-day “probation” and allowed to continue racing based on its proffered plan to improve horse safety. Since then, the CHRB has continued to express serious concerns about the continuing deaths of horses there, including initially limiting its 2021 Racing License to 6 months and this year CHRB Chair Gregory Ferraro say in the August CHRB Meeting that Los Alamitos is not doing enough to protect quarter horses racing there. He was clearly right.
Last week, the CHRB granted another year’s Racing License to Los Alamitos Race Course for 2026, despite being questioned by Commissioner Brenda Washington Davis about the concerning number of horse deaths there recently. The veterinarian and trainer meetings about horse fatalities proffered as mitigation by Los Alamitos owner Cathy Allred, which have been done since Los Al was put on 10-day probation by the CHRB in July 2020, for excessive horse deaths, clearly aren’t working.
It was heartening to see in media reporting yesterday that the CHRB is considering invoking CHRB Rule 1435 to Suspend Los Alamitos’ Racing License IF yet another plan to reduce horse deaths is not proffered by Monday or is considered inadequate. https://www.audacy.com/947thewave/news/los-alamitos-license-threatened-with-3-horse-deaths-in-a-day
The horses whose lives are risked daily and too-often taken at this track for mere gambling deserve to be protected by NOT BEING RACED while Los Alamitos once more tries to get its act together. FILE THE PETITION TO INITIATE CHRB RULE 1435, and hold the Emergency Board Meeting to save horses' lives.
In 2020, two more horses died the weekend after the Board failed to suspend Los Alamitos’ Racing License but instead put this deadly racetrack on ten-day “probation, as the Associated Press reported at the time.
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