Neighbors cry foul

Tuesday, March 21, 2006 | 8:17 a.m.

The first two major horse events at the new South Coast Equestrian Center drew large audiences, but it is not the sweet smell of such success that has nearby residents of that resort abuzz.

It's the odor from steaming piles of horse and cattle manure that is bugging the neighbors.

A horse show last week and one in late February are just two of about 40 events slated for the South Coast this year, prompting homeowners to express concerns about how bad the odor could get during the hot summer months ahead.

"We must exist with our windows closed and cannot use our porches at all," said Frances Roessner, a resident of Cactus Ridge mobile home park just north of the facility. "If these events were rare or sporadic, it would be a different story. But if they are going to be every two weeks or so, it will truly be intolerable."

The next horse event at the 4,500-seat stadium is the All American Reining Classic starting Wednesday. The American Quarter Horse Association's Silver Dollar Circuit annual event was held there last week and ended Sunday.

The late February event was the South Coast Winter Championship and MillionHeir Classic sanctioned by the National Cutting Horse Association. The competition involved isolating cows from a herd.

South Coast officials say it was the cattle that caused the odor problem, not the horses, and that additional odor mitigation methods will be employed for future events involving cows and bulls.

Joe Boteilho, chief of Clark County's code enforcement, agrees with the theory that the cattle likely caused the bad smell a few weeks ago. Cow manure, he said, typically causes more lingering odor problems than its horse counterpart. (There is a physical explanation for this, but you really don't want to know it.)

Boteilho said county Animal Control and Air Quality Control inspectors were at the South Coast horse arena Monday and found no violations of odor ordinances.

Boteilho said local ordinances mandate that operators of sites where livestock are kept take steps to keep the animals' odors under control. But, he said, the mere presence of an odor does not necessarily mean an ordinance has been violated.

"If you have stables, you are going to have some smell," Boteilho said. "Today (Monday), we had inspectors at the (South Coast manure) Dumpsters and they could smell only hay."

Several truckloads of animal waste were transported Monday from the hotel on Las Vegas Boulevard South in covered Republic Services trucks to a compost site in Pahrump, county and resort officials said.

While Roessner was repulsed by the odor a few weeks ago, others in the mobile home park said the smell was not a big deal.

"I didn't smell anything yesterday, but I did notice an odor three weeks ago," said Tim Keliher. "But I didn't think it was that bad - maybe a 3 on a scale of 1 to 10."

Debbie Hoffman, manager of Cactus Ridge, which opened in 1998 and has 193 mobile homes - all but six were occupied as of Monday - said there was a slight odor Sunday, but nowhere as pungent as the one three weeks ago.

"When you talk about whether it is a bad odor it depends on whether you are city or country," Hoffman said. "I'm a country girl who supports equestrian events, but the smell a few weeks ago was pretty potent."

Ryan Growney, assistant general manager of the South Coast, said future events will "be more characteristic" of last week's show than the inaugural event that used 7,000 head of cattle, including 1,800 that were kept on site daily.

"In the future, for roping events, we will have only a couple hundred head of cattle on hand, and we will keep them in an indoor, climate-controlled area," Growney said of the facility that also has 1,200 climate-controlled horse stalls.

Also, for shows featuring cattle, he said, the ground will be treated with a layer of lime covered by dirt and cedar chips to absorb more moisture from dung - a technique that Growney said has been used at other shows around the country to keep odors in check.