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Stabling at the Alameda County Fairgrounds is officially no more as of Tuesday, following weeks of back and forth between fair officials and county leaders who were looking for ways to keep horses at the site for at least a couple more months.
Even though the horses and their trainers had to vacate the site by midnight on Tuesday, an advisory from the California Horse Racing Board, County Supervisor David Haubert and Fairgrounds CEO Jerome Hoban said they were committed to helping families who live at the fairgrounds but are now facing displacement due to the loss of their stabling jobs.
“The Alameda County Fair and Bernal Park Racing made every effort to find a path forward for continued stabling and training in Pleasanton,” Hoban said. “While we are disappointed in this outcome, we remain committed to supporting those affected by this transition.”
The California Association of Racing Fairs, the joint-powers authority that conducts business activity with fair associations and also represents the horse racing industry in the state, announced in January it was not going to pursue any horse racing meets this year, including at the summer fair in Pleasanton.
CARF had rallied to try to put together a full year of racing in 2025 following the closing of Golden Gate Fields — the horse racing track in Berkeley that had typically hosted these horse meets — late last year.
It had previously been the organization’s intent to make Pleasanton the new hub for horse racing in Northern California, but according to members of the Alameda County Fair Association, millions of dollars had been lost just trying to rescue Bay Area horse racing with last fall’s Golden State Racing meet in Pleasanton, which made it difficult for even the annual fair circuit to continue.
“We spent a total of over $5 million dollars to try to save horseracing in Northern California,” Fair Association Board Member Chuck Moore said to the county during a Alameda County Ad Hoc Agricultural Fair Association Committee on March 18.
During that ad hoc committee meeting, members of the fair provided the county with updates not just on the future of horse racing, but on the effect the racetrack closure would have on families who work for the trainers and depend on horses being there at the fairgrounds because taking care of horses is their entire jobs.
“We are workers at the Pleasanton racetrack in the Alameda County Fairgrounds and are going to lose our job/income and our homes,” racetrack workers who are affected by the shuttering of horse racing at the fairgrounds stated in a Jan. 28 letter obtained by the Weekly.
The letter included almost 200 signatures of people who worked at the racetrack as stable guards, maintenance workers, groomers and many other positions that are impacted by the closure of the racetrack.
Shawn Wilson, Haubert’s chief of staff, told the Weekly on Tuesday that while he has heard that nobody from the RV park located inside the fairgrounds is being evicted, there is still the issue of families who might be displaced because their main form of income is going away.
“Our children go to school here and we just packed up and moved in June 2024 to start our new lives with stability. We purchased trailers, invested in the local community and pay taxes to the city of Pleasanton and Alameda County,” the Jan. 28 letter further stated. “We feel that we are being treated unfairly and given an unreasonable amount of time to pivot our lives.”
Hoban said the fairgrounds is going to continue to work with the county and other local agencies like CityServe of the Tri-Valley, Winners Foundation and Racetrack of America to “provide support and connect the affected families with available resources”.
“Our housing staff is working with the city of Pleasanton’s housing staff as well as City Serve to provide resources to those affected,” Wilson told the Weekly on Tuesday.
According to fair officials, there are about 120 people and 45 RVs on the fairgrounds involved with horse racing — other guests who stay in the RV park are not included in that number.
Wilson added that the county has been working with the Pleasanton Unified School District to “ensure the students remain in school”.
A fairgrounds spokesperson pointed to a previous statement made by PUSD director of communications Patrick Gannon where he said even though the district couldn’t say how many families are affected by the racetrack closure, those families who are affected and might have to move will still have the option to continue in the district through the end of the school year, even if they move out of Pleasanton.
“All efforts to reverse or extend horse racing in Alameda County have been exhausted — today was the deadline,” Pleasanton City Councilmember Julie Testa said after attending a liaison meeting where the city received an update from the fair board Monday. “Some families with children in school may stay until the end of the school year, but the horses will not.”
During the March 18 committee meeting between county and the fair association, county leaders like Haubert and Supervisor Nate Miley attempted to work out different scenarios where they could all work together in extending the stabling contract at least throughout the dry season to give those families more time to get their ducks in a row.
However, as per Sunday’s advisory regarding stabling at the fairgrounds, none of those plans ever came to fruition.
“Please be aware that as of March 25 at midnight, Alameda County Fairgrounds in Pleasanton will no longer be an approved auxiliary training facility of Santa Anita Park,” the advisory states. “The agreement between the Southern Stabling and Vanning Committee (TOC and the southern tracks), the California Authority of Racing Fairs, and the Alameda County Fair will end on that date.”
One of the main pushbacks for continuing to have horses at the fairgrounds came from the fair association during the March 18 meeting where Hoban and other fair board members told the county the fairground’s wastewater issues.
According to the fair association, the fairgrounds’ wastewater was found out of compliance with local discharge regulations. That the runoff water with high levels of pollution led to various notices from agencies like the San Francisco Bay Regional Water Quality Control Board that needed to be addressed by the fair.
But in order to address the facility’s longstanding regulatory wastewater and stormwater discharge problems and achieve compliance with those regulations, fair board members said the horses needed to be gone.
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