While finishing her work week last Friday in downtown Los Angeles, Carly Heath checked her inbox to find an alarming email from management at the Los Angeles Equestrian Center, where she boards her draft-cross mare. 

“We want to update you on current operations at the Los Angeles Equestrian Center following the unexpected resignations of several site crew members today,” the email began. “Please be assured that the health and well-being of every horse on site remains our top priority.”

Heath, who has boarded at the facility on and off since 2012, had heard nothing about the resignations, but she knew that the 75-acre boarding, training and show facility relied heavily on the knowledge and skill of several dozen employees to manage the hundreds of horses in its daily care. Because her own horse had colicked in the past, Heath worried that a delayed feed schedule might set off another episode—but even more, she was concerned about rumors swirling around the circumstances of these staffing changes.

Heath quickly connected with fellow boarders about the message. The other horse owners said that a group of employees had been fired on Thursday, Aug. 7, due to a lack of paperwork verifying their ability to work legally in the U.S. 

That account seemed to be verified by Mayor Karen Bass in a Fox 11 Los Angeles news story the same day, when she described a connection between federal immigration enforcement and the terminations at LAEC.

“Apparently, I guess [U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement] asked for whether or not the employees had proper identification and through e-Verify, and that’s all I know right now,” Bass told Fox. “But what’s important to me, though is, is ICE changing their tactics? Are they changing their tactics?”

Heath left work and headed straight to LAEC, which borders Griffith Park in Burbank, California. There, she found that her horse had been fed thanks to a fellow boarder, but her horse’s stall was in poor shape. As she soon learned—despite the reassuring email—a group of nearly a dozen stall-muckers had been let go the previous day, and their coworkers had not resumed their typical schedules when they returned to the grounds Friday morning.

“The rest of the guys walked out in protest because there’s been no transparency,” Bridget Woody, a rider at LAEC, said on Tuesday. “And the boarders are trying to get a meeting with management, and they are declining even to make an appointment.”  

Woody has ridden with multiple LAEC-based trainers over the past 17 years and has become friends with many of the men who allegedly were terminated Thursday. She said that a lack of transparency in management led to confusion among the employees. Those who remain are uncertain that their jobs are secure. 

“These are people I’ve worked shoulder-to-shoulder with for almost 20 years, they’re my family,” she said. “They’re just wonderful, wonderful people, and they’ve worked so hard for so long, and to be treated like this is just insane.”

While initial news reports said that “up to 40” employees had been fired, people who work and board at LAEC said the number is closer to 10, though the fates of an additional 20-30 employees are uncertain. The property is managed by Legends, an events company that acquired ASM Global in August 2024. The company holds the lease to run the business on land owned by the City of Los Angeles. 

In an email to the Chronicle, Legends declined to comment on the number of employees who resigned or were fired, where the order to remove them originated, and the reason for their departure. 

“The Los Angeles Equestrian Center prioritizes the health, safety, and well-being of every horse entrusted to our care,” Legends wrote in a statement on behalf of LAEC. “As a matter of policy, we do not comment on personnel issues.”

Joe Thorpe runs his hunter/jumper barn, Sovereign Place Training Stables, out of LAEC. He says that most training programs have their own privately hired staff, while LAEC workers manage the basic feeding and stall cleaning throughout the 500-stall facility. “I’ve been there for over 20 years, and I’m probably the lead trainer there, so to speak,” he said. “So I very intimately know about the center and its ongoings.” 

Thorpe had a different interpretation of what occurred on Friday, and added that the delay in feeding and mucking was minimal. 

“The rumors were out and about, many of them were totally false; that didn’t occur,” said Thorpe, who estimated that roughly 60% of the staff is still working. “Horses were all fed. Horses all had water.”

Thorpe had heard that the work stoppage on Friday morning was due to a meeting of concerned workers with LAEC management. Thorpe said that on Friday, dozens of the remaining colleagues of those who allegedly had been terminated sat down for a meeting with management to get clarification on what had happened to their coworkers’ jobs. 

“My understanding was that there was a group of people that were asked to verify their paperwork to be employees there,” Thorpe said. “Several people were unable to supply the documents that they wanted, and they were let go on Thursday.

“They were all concerned,” Thorpe continued. “Their lead person, who’s been at the center for over 15 years, was trying to talk to management. They came over to the office where they were, and they talked for a few minutes, and then they were all instructed that HR would be arriving.”

Boarders shared that many of the remaining stall cleaners and feeders had resumed work by late Friday morning.

“My understanding is that management here at the center is in the process of hiring new employees to make up the difference,” Thorpe said of the reduced staff. “[Los Angeles] Parks and Recreation [also] sent over employees to help in and around the barns, whatever they could do. So they came over on the weekend.”

Neither the mayor’s office nor the City of Los Angeles Department of Recreation and Parks responded to the Chronicle’s request for comment. The Chronicle also attempted to reach employees but was unsuccessful.

Multiple factors play into the confusion around the situation, including the language barrier between primarily English-speaking management and boarders, and primarily Spanish-speaking employees. But Woody said that even employees who speak English fluently came out of their conversations with management uncertain about why their coworkers had been fired.

“They absolutely don’t understand why,” she said, referring to a friend who was let go. “He’s a really good guy, and he speaks pretty good English, but he absolutely did not understand why they got let go.”

Without knowing the extent of the terminations, or whether there are more to come, boarders have been rallying around the workers who remain. Heath says that there’s a sense among those at LAEC that they want to find meaningful ways to support the remaining staff.

Some boarders are investigating legal routes to saving the jobs of those who have been let go, including navigating sanctuary city laws, and petitioning for agriculture protection for undocumented workers. Those who are interested in offering financial assistance are concerned that formal fundraising that would identify workers as undocumented might put them in jeopardy. Heath says her fellow boarders have been taking a more face-to-face approach. 

“I’ve heard a lot of people say, ‘I’m going head to the ATM before I go to the barn and give cash to the people who are working there,’ ” Heath said. “It’s been heartening to see how many people have been sharing videos and posts about it. People really, genuinely seem heartbroken over the fact that there are people who have been there for 10, 20, 30 years, who are gone.”

Woody knows how demanding the work of horse keeping is, and she said that the boarders and trainers at LAEC have a strong culture of respect for the employees who do that labor.

“I’ve worked at some really fancy places—like the best places in the L.A. area—and the way the staff is treated at other places made me cringe,” she said. “But at LAEC, we understand that it is a very difficult job. We appreciate them.

“At the end of the day, they’re well within their rights to fire people who aren’t documented,” Woody continued. “But is it the right thing to do?”