Tuesday was the first of three evenings of meetings the Village of Wellington (Florida) council is holding to consider proposed zoning changes that could pave the way for expanded show grounds at Wellington International. For five hours, the five-member council listened to presentations before a packed house, with many members of the audience wearing red shirts emblazoned with the slogans “horses not houses” and “vote no.” The meetings continue tonight and tomorrow. (Watch the archived meeting livestream here.)

The plan, first put forth by Wellington Lifestyle Partners in September 2022, seeks to remove about 96 acres of land from Wellington’s Equestrian Preserve and rezone it for more dense residential development, while adding a different parcel of about 114 acres to the Wellington International show grounds.

The meeting began with a presentation from Kelly Ferraiolo, senior planner in the Village of Wellington Planning, Zoning and Strategic Division, that outlined the basics of the items on the agenda.

Then Doug McMahon, CEO and managing partner of Wellington Lifestyle Partners, gave prepared remarks.

“Throughout this process and application, we’ve tried to meet with anyone who wanted to meet; we’ve listened; we’ve learned. And we’ve certainly modified our plans based on constructive criticisms to make our applications and our plans better,” he said. “All segments of the Wellington community have added to this process, whether on social media, some at HOA meetings, and a wide range of other forums.

“The process has been hard,” he continued. “It’s been passionate, and it should be. People across this community care deeply about Wellington. And after 12 months here, my experience is this: I’d say largely this process has worked, and worked well. Everyone has made our plans and our applications better.”

McMahon emphasized that Wellington Lifestyle Partners has agreed to more than 30 binding conditions of approval, and expects to invest about $40 million to $50 million in infrastructure and required facilities on the explanded show grounds property before any housing can be built on the land proposed for removal from the equestrian preserve. They have also committed to keeping the Adequan Global Dressage Festival running at its current Equestrian Village site, which is within the equestrian preserve land proposed for residential redevelopment, until the new show facilities are ready.

“None of us are here to litigate or relive the past 20 years. Our applications are really about the future,” McMahon said. “This is Day One of a new chapter for the community. We’re looking forward to one shared goal: How do we keep Wellington Wellington? How do we ensure it’s the premier horse community in the world?

“I think it’s by making sure the show grounds thrive here,” he continued. “It’s making sure the best competitors desire to still come here and compete here. And it ensures for everybody in the community that it’s the finest equestrian lifestyle, and all the benefits cascade through the community because of the equestrian industry here in Wellington. That is the secret sauce. That is the key that makes Wellington Wellington. So making sure the show grounds are the best for horses, riders, for teams and guests is where it all starts.”

After McMahon’s presentation, the meeting opened to comments from interested parties (sometimes via lawyers or other representatives speaking on their behalf), who testified both in favor and against the proposed land use changes. The testimony from interested parties will continue Wednesday night and Thursday night if necessary.

Common concerns expressed by those opposed were the precedent that would be set by removing land from the equestrian preserve, the ownership behind the entities involved in the developments, and whether Wellington Lifestyle Partners has the financial wherewithal to deliver on the show grounds improvements. Those who spoke in favor were concerned about the future of Wellington International and its ability to keep pace with other facilities.

Attorney Harvey Oyer spoke on behalf of the Jacobs family, who own Deeridge Farms. Their property is adjacent to the northern parcel of land where Equestrian Village is located, which would become the Wellington North development.

“The Jacobs family obviously loves Wellington and the equestrian preserve, and it is their primary goal to protect the unique character of the equestrian community for generations to come. From the outset, the family has had an open mind about this applicant, and their promises to strengthen and improve our equestrian community,” Oyer said. “The family previously expressed at the first reading that they had a cautiously neutral view. Today, however, there are still many details that we do not know. And the family remembers well the history of past failed promises by other developers over the years.”

Oyer discussed the conditions of approval put in place by the council, including landscape buffering and the removal of access points on Pierson Road, as well as the requirements for the new show ground facilities.

“These are all very helpful safeguards suggested by your staff, and we urge you to adopt them should you approve the applicants proposals tonight. However, these staff conditions we believe are not enough,” he said. “Should the council elect to move forward with approval of the applicants proposals, we strongly urge you to adopt additional conditions that exceed what your staff has recommended. This is for the protection of the public, the protection of all those people who come after us, and to ensure that the applicant delivers exactly what has been promised to this community.”

Oyer outlined a number of additional conditions that the Jacobs family suggested, including requiring that the new show grounds should “at a minimum consist of the specifications marketed by the applicant to this community,” he said.

The renderings of the proposed show grounds expansion that have been put forth by Wellington Lifestyle Partners include many more amenities than are actually required for approval of their application, and many have expressed concern that those more extensive facilities will never be built.

Oyer also said that the new facilities should be built to Fédération Equestre Internationale parameters, and should be tested by footing experts.

Amateur hunter rider John Ingram owns a farm on Pierson Road and spoke in support of expanding the show grounds.

“I’m in favor of these revised applications, even if it means maybe some inconvenience for me [and my family members who ride],” he said. “That’s because I look at the bigger picture. And I look, and I see the horse show needs to grow and expand. It’s landlocked. And what I see has been proposed here is a is a practical solution that will be good for the equestrian community and good for the overall village.”

“The fact that over the past 30, 40 years, Wellington has grown into the horse capital of the world, and is attractive to not not only so many Americans, but Europeans, South Americans and others, does not mean that we have some divine right to expect that in the future, if we just sit on our hands and do nothing or delay for forever. We currently have the best hunters and jumpers in the world. They’re here. And this could all change,” he continued. “There are other facilities; Ocala [Florida] has invested hugely in their facilities and in prize money. If we mess around and don’t take advantage of this unique opportunity, I think we stand a very strong chance of waking up in five to 10 years and finding that Ocala, Thermal [California] or somewhere else has taken over the top destination spot.”

Murray Kessler, former president of the U.S. Equestrian Federation, said he was initially opposed to the proposal but changed his mind because of the conditions that have been put in place, and he added that he has heard a lot of support from the equestrian community.

“Guarantees have been put in place that no houses can be built before the new equestrian facility is built. Which, to me, is the issue. We have to have this horse show solidified. If you don’t do this, it’s landlocked, it shrinks, and you lose major pieces of the sport,” Kessler said.

Addressing the council, he said, “You and your staff have done your job and done it well. Exercising your duty of care through great due diligence, and community involvement. I believe the process would stand up to any bullying threats of recall—and, tonight, litigation, which I find shocking and petty, but sadly not surprising. You can stand tall.

“If you decide to approve, you can still stand tall in that approval of the project,” he continued. “This is a very unique opportunity, as John Ingram said, and you don’t want to pass it by. It will be remembered as the moment Wellington ensured itself to remain the equestrian capital of the world. And finally, I think this whole community needs to turn its focus on how we get this horse show out of the hands of a short term private equity organization that isn’t investing in it and into the hands of long term investment.”

Cynthia Gardner, a Wellington resident since 1977 who served as chair of the Equestrian Preserve Committee for six years, was one of several residents who expressed concern about the precedent set by removing land from the preserve, and how that might permanently alter the community’s character.

Gardner recalled that in 2001 the Equestrian Preserve Committee was asked to create the Equestrian Overlay Zoning District. “The purpose of that was so we would never have to worry about the protection and the preservation of the equestrian properties in Wellington. Because of that promise, over the last decades, hundreds of millions of dollars have been invested,” she said. “People from all over the world have come and built farms and homes, because they thought that they were coming to an equestrian community that would be here forever. The highest and best use of the property in the Equestrian Preserve is not for housing development. We have lots and lots of houses in Wellington.”

Gardner noted that previous requests have been made to change the zoning in the preserve, but this is the first time a request has been made to remove land from it.

“This is something that would be devastating to the area,” she said. “By removing land from the equestrian preserve, we open the door for other people to do this as well. Staff has stated that they don’t think this would start a precedent, but they provided no evidence of that. We, however, have a tremendous amount of evidence that this in fact does happen.”

She cited Royal Palm Polo in Boca Raton (Florida) as an example.

“They had an enormous equestrian amenity with 10 polo fields, 15 barns, show grounds, show stables, all kinds of things, which were subsequently picked away by developers until there’s nothing left,” she said. “We have Gulfstream Polo, which was on Lake Worth Road—640 acres that consisted of private farms, polo fields, club barns, galloping tracks. Again, this was all picked away by developers. It no longer exists.

“This is evidence that opening the door to a developer, no matter how appealing it sounds, would be a mistake for us. Promising a horse show in exchange for housing sounds like it would be a good idea. But there’s no legal connection between the horse show and the developer,” she continued. “They’ve promised to replace Global. But that doesn’t take away from the fact that our horse show is for sale, and we have no idea what’s going to happen there. We’re putting the cart before the horse. The equestrian industry is the only industry that we have. And without careful planning, we could do irreparable damage.”

Maureen Brennan, a former show jumper turned polo player, has been a vocal opponent of the project, and she started a recall petition for the council members who voted in favor of it in November. She responded to a comment made by McMahon that the equestrian preserve was “not a preserve in the strictest sense of a conservation easement that has no development,” like Yellowstone National Park or Central Park in New York.

“This is our Yellowstone,” she said. “I don’t think it should be minimized just because it’s not 300,000 acres. It’s the same to us. And as far as the preserve is defined in our village documents, I don’t think it should be redefined by a developer.”

Brennan expressed concern that the applications had not been “fully vetted,” and raised questions about the specifics of the proposed housing developments.

“The horse show is a distraction from this primary issue. We can all agree improvements are necessary, and expansion is desirable, but it’s not the application before this council,” she said, noting that the applications are for the Wellington North and South developments.

Regarding the conditions put in place to secure the facilities at the new show grounds, “I don’t even know why we’re talking about conditions,” she said. “To me, that’s a compromise. When you start negotiating, it’s about a compromise, it’s going to be half of something or the other. Taking land out of reserve is just an absolute devastating prospect for what’s going to happen to Wellington after that. Funding for the show? I heard if we can build the houses first, we’ll have the funds. Well, that’s pretty backwards.

“As citizens, I feel like we’re entirely left without any options of how to deal with our town in a situation like this,” she continued. “We’ve got all this public outcry, no reaction—there was blank from this council back in November, as far as I was concerned, about what everyone in this room had to say. Amazing presentations, facts, huge opposition—didn’t matter. So what are we left with? How do we protect ourselves? We have a vote coming up in March [to elect new council members]. We know that that’s too far; this meeting is today, tomorrow and the next day. And I don’t know what the rush is. Because if this does go through this week, this next council will have to deal with this mess.”

Attorneys Leonard Feiwus and Marc Kasowitz of Kasowitz Benson Torres LLP, the latter of whom is a Wellington resident in Equestrian Club Estates, spoke on behalf of Lynda Sirota, president of the Equestrian Club Estates Property Owners Association, and Thomas and Rosemary Wayman. The two spoke at length, taking up their full hour of allotted time, and on cross-examination both had testy exchanges with members of the council and an attorney representing Wellington Lifestyle Partners.

Kasowitz echoed the concerns brought up by previous people about the specifics of the housing developments, the requirements for the show facilities, whether Wellington Lifestyle Partners has the “financial wherewithal” to fulfill their promises, and the precedent set by taking land out of the preserve.

“Once you abrogate the village charter, which provides for the sanctity and protection of the equestrian preserve, for one developer or one developer group, you have set a precedent that will have no bounds,” Kasowitz said. “And you’re doing all of that in return for moving a dressage ring across the street. That’s the benefit that is coming to the village of Wellington. Then you have created a precedent, a bar so low, that in the future, when developers, other developers look at Wellington and say, ‘Hey, I want to get some of that golden aura of that equestrian community, which is known throughout the world, I want to have a piece of that. And all I have to do is find another dressage ring, or some similarly valued asset and move it across the street, and I can have it too.’ And they’ll have an argument. They’ll have an argument backed up by the facts of exactly what is happening here.”

Feiwus criticized what he said was a lack of due diligence by the council and suggested waiting to vote until new council members are sworn in.

Kasowitz and Feiwus also spoke about a poll, conducted by Trafalgar Group and commissioned on behalf of their clients, that surveyed Wellington residents about their support for the developments and show grounds expansion. They found 80% of Wellington residents surveyed were against it, although Mayor Anne Gerwig suggested the poll was misleading and didn’t explain all the village was getting in return, like a 50-plus acre parcel of land to become a public park.

“How do you know that this is what the dressage people want? You’re not dressage people,” Feiwus said. “You’re not the dressage community. The dressage community is here. They’re here with pitchforks and torches. They don’t want it.”

Feiwus referred to previous comments from council member Michael Drahos. “You said, ‘Look, we want to do what’s best for the equestrian community, maybe the equestrian community doesn’t really appreciate that they might lose [the Adequan Global Dressage Festival].’ They appreciate it. They’re sophisticated people. There’s a lot of wealthy people in the community, people who have been in this industry for a long, long time; they’re people who have committed their lives to it. They know what’s at stake. They’re just not prepared on this record to take this. It needs more seasoning. It needs more due diligence; it needs more review,” he said.

The meeting will continue at 6 p.m. ET Wednesday, and if necessary, on Thursday as well. Click here for our previous coverage on how to watch or find more information about the issues discussed.

[Editor’s note: Wellington International is owned by the Global Equestrian Group, which also owns The Chronicle of the Horse.]