14-1118_BLENHEIM FACILITY MANAGEMENT_CC_D14_correspondence_1511118/2014
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November 14, 2014
San Juan Capistrano City Council
32400 Paseo Adelanto
San Juan Capistrano, CA 92675
Honorable Council Members of San Juan Capistrano:
On behalf of the Sart Juan Capistrano Equestrian Coalition (SJCEC) we strongly recommend that you
renew Blenheim Facility Management lease of the Rancho Mission Viejo Riding Park. Many of the
requests you hear will be passionate and emotional. What we would like you to consider are
financial facts. In 2008, the SJCEC commissioned an economic impact report to assess the impact of
the equestrians on the San Juan based businesses. Based on our survey results, we quickly
discovered we had set the values of how much the equestrians spent in our city too low. For
example, we interviewed several horse show attendees that had rented houses in San Juan and
spent over $50,000 per family in 12 weeks .in our city. Our surveys showed that the horse show
guests and boarders spend millions in our city every year.
The average equestrian that traveled to San Juan to show at a Blenheim Facility Management show
brought multiple family members, dined out 3 times a day, bought supplies at Denaults, groceries at
the grocery stores, plants at Plant Depot, shopped at the local stores and went to the movies.
Starbucks on Ortega told us that they kept a schedule of the horse shows since they needed to
double the amount of pastries and food items during the show season. The equestrian is a quiet
but important fixture in our downtown. They are an economic force and can be seen in their riding
boots at many of our local restaurants and stores. The local hotels book up quickly during show
season and are utilized midweek as well as the weekends. High end hotels like the Ritz Carlton, the
Montage and St. Regis get a fair share of the equestrian participants but would happily stay in San
Juan if there was an equivalent caliber hotel.
In addition to attracting big spenders, Blenheim has also graciously hosted and donated the
facilities for the Two Stepping Under the Stars for the last 2 years. This past July over 2000 guests
attended and enjoyed the beautiful grass fields and ambience under the oak trees.
Many citizens did not realize the Rancho Mission Viejo Riding Park has hosted 2 Olympic Team trials
and is home to our Olympic Equestrian Jumping Team Coach, Robert Ridland. Not only do they host
world class equestrian events that are free to the public but they also host IEL shows (high school
competitions) and local affordable shows that all ages utilize. The shows generally run from
Tuesday to Sunday and on weekends the soccer tournaments co -exist peacefully with the
equestrians.
Thank you for your time and consideration of this request.
The San Juan Capistrano Equestrian Coalition
San Juan Ca istrano, CA 92693 1SAN;1..; CI I T„� J
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