The Thoroughbred Owners and Breeders Association will honor national award winners at its awards dinner Sept. 7 at Fasig-Tipton in Lexington. Five national winners have been announced ahead of time, and BloodHorse Daily is offering profiles of these winners throughout the week.
Today we profile Frank Taylor, winner of the Dr. J. David Richardson Industry Service Award.
This year’s Thoroughbred Owners and Breeders Association’s Dr. J. David Richardson Industry Service Award recognizes Frank Taylor, the founder of the trailblazing nonprofit organization Stable Recovery.
Taylor, the director of new business development at his family’s Taylor Made Farm near Nicholasville, Ky., launched the program in 2021 with 10 recovering addicts. Three and a half years later, the organization has expanded and grown. It currently houses 52 men in facilities across the Bluegrass State.
“I really think the program could be all over the country and even all over the world in 10 years,” Taylor said. “We’ve got the model pretty much perfected at this point. My vision is that we could get a dormitory on the back of one of these racetracks soon.”
Stable Recovery was inspired by Taylor’s mentor, Rob Perez, who runs DV8 Kitchen in downtown Lexington. Inspired by the workers in Perez’s kitchen, all recovering addicts, Taylor implemented Stable Recovery with the help of Perez. The nationally accredited 501(c)(3) program, which takes in men from across the country, requires participants to adhere to a strict military-like regime on their quest for sobriety. Taylor explained that the men must wake up at 5 a.m. every day, attend an AA meeting, work from 7 a.m.-4 p.m. on the farm or learn their lessons at the School of Horsemanship, and then attend another AA meeting upon returning to the dormitory.
“It’s a big key to have purposeful work for them and teach them the skills where they have a shot to move forward,” Taylor said. “These guys come here, they get exposed to horses, and some of them have never touched a horse before. So they get that experience, but then we start talking to them in their first 30 days about what direction they would want to go.”
After completing the Stable Recovery program, many of the men find employment with the organization’s network of partners.
“The first two years, we hired everyone who came out of the program at Taylor Made. And then we got fully staffed,” Taylor said. “We didn’t reach out to other farms, other farms reached out to us and said they were looking for help. So we built these strategic alliances with about 10 major farms, veterinary clinics, and transportation businesses in the industry. We have people at 10 different places now. And we’re still taking on more strategic partners.”
Stable Recovery boasts a sobriety rate three times the national average for similar programs, and the organization has reunited 802 family members over a 3 1/2-year span.
“I feel confident we’ve saved some lives,” Taylor said. “It’s been good for the industry, it’s been good for them, it’s been great for society. You’re turning nontaxpayers into taxpayers. You’re giving people hope and purpose and that’s what they need. It’s very effective and it’s amazing how good it works. It amazes me that someone hasn’t been doing this earlier.”
By Molly Rollins
Learn more at TOBA Awards Week: Taylor Lands Industry Service Award – BloodHorse