The Oak Tree Charitable Foundation has pledged $50,000 towards the purchase of an equine Standing Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) facility to be added to the Equine Imaging Center at Santa Anita before the end of 2019, officials from the Southern California Equine Foundation (SCEF) announced Nov. 15.
“This major gift is an exceptionally important step forward toward our goal of meeting the Nov. 15 deadline for purchasing the MRI,” said Karen Klawitter of SCEF. “We are so appreciative of Oak Tree's most recent support, and all its many contributions over the years.
She continued, “The equine hospital built at Santa Anita in 1981 would not have been possible without Oak Tree's support over several years of $465,000, as well as funding the then-revolutionary horse ambulances now in use throughout California.”
Fundraising is continuing for SCEF and will do so once the Imaging Center is complete, according to Klawitter.
“We're so pleased that many individual trainers, owners, track executives, and fans have contributed to this campaign,” she said.
John Barr, president of Oak Tree, added, “Equine health and welfare have long been priorities of Oak Tree, and we're so pleased we can continue our longstanding efforts to assist California racing. Nothing is more important to racing than modernizing our diagnostic tools to the state-of-the-art, and the Standing MRI will be immediately useful.”
To make a donation, contact Southern California Equine Foundation (scef-inc.com). Donations are tax-deductible to the fullest extent permitted by law.
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