HORSE SENSE
Periodic updates about issues and actions concerning New York City's Carriage Horses +
Coalition to Ban Horse-Drawn Carriages
www.banhdc.org
Horses Without Carriages International
www.horseswithoutcarriages.org
PLEASE FORWARD TO LISTS, FRIENDS & COLLEAGUES ** DoH proposes carriage horse regs ** NY Post ** Psychic predicts phase out ** Cincinnati accident ** Italy
HAPPY NEW YEAR!
Let's hope this is the year that brings
real progress to this issue -- a ban of the
horse-drawn carriage industry in NYC. Our
organization has been instrumental in making
this an issue that has resonated around the
world and appeared on many radar screens. We
are going into the fifth year of our
existence and we have as much energy as we
did when we began. We always knew it would
not be easy. If you recall, in December 2005
- there was no organized effort to ban the
horse and buggy trade.
We work with
and support our colleagues in other cities -
especially Philadelphia, Chicago and Rome,
where the campaigns are in full force. If New
Delhi in India can ban horse-drawn carriages,
so can NYC.
NEW PROPOSED REGULATIONS FROM DOH ON CARRIAGE HORSES
Public Hearing - Tuesday February 4, 2010
The Department of Health and Mental Hygiene
has proposed updates and modifications to
Health
Code Article 161 and Chapter
4 of the Commissioner's Regulations
concerning
carriage horses. A public hearing will be
held to discuss these proposals and the
public is invited to provide comments.
- WHEN: Tuesday, February 3, 2010 -
10:00
AM to 12:00 noon
- WHERE: Department of Health - 125
Worth
St. - Rm. 330
- SUGGESTION: If you wish to testify,
please call (212) 788-5010 to preregister.
You will have five minutes to make
comments. Your comments should also be in
writing - bring several copies.
- SEND TO: If you are not able to
attend
this hearing, please send written comments
to: Rena Bryant, Secretary to the Board of
Health, 125 Worth St. CN-31, New York, NY
10013; You may also send by e-mail to
http://www.nyc.gov/html/doh/html/notice/notice.shtml
Please click on the above links for 161 and 4
to get the proposed regulations. We will
be going through these proposals very
carefully to prepare our
comments. If anyone wishes to work with
us, please let me know at
coal...@banhdc.org. Please note that
the regulations cannot change things that are
already in the administrative
code.Only the City Council can change
these laws, which would then need to be
signed by the Mayor.
NY POST GETS IT ALL WRONG
read comments below
NY Post - 12/30/09 - David Seifman
New
Laws Set Steed Limits - It'll no
longer be a dog's life for the
horses in Central Park.
New rules proposed yesterday by the Health
Department would guarantee the hard-working
buggy-pullers five weeks of vacation a year,
no work after 3 a.m., and nostrils that no
longer have to endure secondhand smoke.
In what amounts to the city's first
outdoor-smoking ban, the carriage drivers and
their passengers would no longer be allowed
to light up under regulations that could take
effect as early as March.
"Just like cabdrivers, they shouldn't be
smoking," declared Daniel Kass, the Health
Department's acting assistant commissioner
for environmental health.
He said the new rules were drawn up in
response to findings by an advisory board
that studied "best practices" and included
both animal advocates and members of the
horse-rental industry.
Three months ago, Comptroller Bill Thompson
scolded the agency for not moving more
quickly to implement the recommendations.
Horse drivers will soon face the same
restrictions as cabbies: No cellphones, no
texting, no music players and no cameras.
City officials decided that all those tech
marvels were too distracting.
Horse owners will also have to supply
thermometers so drivers can take readings
after every trip and enter them into a log book.
When temperatures drop below 18 or above 90,
the horses would get the day off.
Kass said the advisory board suggested horses
get two months off every year, but the Health
Department ultimately settled on five weeks.
"Operators are invited to give them more," he
said.
Carolyn Daly, a spokeswoman for the
horse-carriage industry, said that wouldn't
be a burden to most owners, who already give
their animals long breaks at nearby farms.
Kuddusi Demir, 28, one of the Central Park
drivers, also endorsed the idea.
"Five weeks vacation is good. I need
vacation, too," he said.
But Demir questioned the need to take
temperatures.
"That's stupid. The temperature can vary from
block to block," he said.
Cheney Preporius, 21, a South African student
visiting the city with her boyfriend, George
Smith, 24, wondered if the Central Park
horses would rather stay in the city than
spend idle days on a farm.
"What does a horse do on vacation? Will they
put their feet up? In the wild they'd just be
running around anyway," Preporius said.
A public hearing on the new rules is
scheduled for Feb. 3.
LETTERS SUBMITTED BUT NOT PUBLISHED (YET)
: Elaine Sloan:
The proposed "fixes" to make the carriage
horse industry acceptable is like putting a
bandaid on an elephant's ass. What a joke!
The proposals are barely worth
mentioning. The truth is, once again,
CARRIAGE HORSES DON'T BELONG in the streets!
No one can "fix" the fumes, sounds, heavy
traffic, hard pavement.
IT IS TIME TO RETIRE THE HORSES TO PASTURE
once and for all.
Elizabeth Forel: Your report on the
proposed Health Department
regulations misses the point. Five weeks of
vacation taken out of context sounds good -
more than most people get. But here's the
rub. These horses work nine hours a day,
seven days a week in congested traffic in all
kinds of bad weather conditions. They live
in cramped stalls in multi storied
warehouses. They are herd animals and need
daily turnout - a pasture to run free and
socialize with other horses. This does not
exist in the barren warehouse buildings where
they live. Five weeks of vacation is
meaningless in this context because the
horses are broken and exhausted by that time.
There are many problems with these proposed
regulations including the disingenuous so
called smoking ban. The real danger to the
horse's lungs comes from living a nose to
tailpipe existence, sucking up car and bus
exhaust all day.
Sounds like the City is horsing around with
these regulations, trying to placate critics
of the industry. But it can never be made
right. The only logical and humane solution
is to shut down this anachronistic trade and
to retire the horses to sanctuaries - saving
them from a life of exploitation pulling
unsafe carriages around crowded streets.
PHASE OUT OF HORSE-DRAWN CARRIAGES IN NYC?
according to Celtic psychic Paula Roberts
Cindy Adams, gossip columnist for the NY
Post reports in her 12/30/09 column All
in Crystal Ball about the predictions
of Celtic psychic Paula Roberts. Let's hope
that Cindy is right when she says that Celts
are great seers.
This is what Ms. Roberts says for New York
City 2010:
Central Park starts phasing out horsedrawn
carriages.
CINCINNATI - TWO CARRIAGE ACCIDENTS IN ONE WEEK
scared horse; flimsy carriage spells disaster
Horse
breaks free from carriage in Hyde Park
Square
Dec 23, 2009 -
CINCINNATI, OH (FOX19) - A carriage driver
was injured and his carriage and a light post
damaged after a horse spooked and took off in
Hyde Park Square Wednesday night.
Police say it happened around 7:15 p.m. when
the horse pulling a carriage got startled,
and took off, crashing the carriage into a
light post, and breaking free of its harness.
The carriage overturned, and knocked over the
light post.
The driver was taken to the hospital with
minor injuries.
The horse ran loose for about a half hour
before police caught it. Aside from being
startled, the animal was unharmed.
Horse
Drawn Carriage Involved In Hit-Skip -
COVINGTON, Ky - 12/26/09 - The John A.
Roebling suspension bridge Friday night after
a collision involving a vehicle and a horse
drawn carriage, dispatchers said.
Dispatchers said the crash happened just
after 10:30 p.m. The driver of the car fled
the scene and continued into Covington.
Dispatchers said the several passengers were
on the carriage at the time of the crash.
There were reports that the carriage driver
was taken to the hospital, but no injuries
were confirmed.
The bridge has since reopened.
Covington Police were investigating the incident.
COALITION ASKS CINCINNATI MAYOR & COUNCIL TO BAN INDUSTRY
picked up by Cincinnati media and New Zealand
Group
Supports Ban On Horse-Drawn Carriages -
CINCINNATI -- A national group is claiming
Cincinnati's horse-drawn carriages are
unsafe. The New York based Coalition To Ban
Horse-Drawn Carriages is focusing on
Cincinnati after two accidents have occurred
in the last month.
The group says the carriages are open, unsafe
and pose serious dangers to horses, drivers
and passengers.
The group urges Mark Mallory and Cincinnati
City Council to act now to prevent further
accidents.
Two
carriage accidents in two days in
Cincinnati
-- Two horse-drawn carriage accidents in two
days in Cincinnati have prompted a fresh call
to have them banned from the city.
The Coalition to Ban Horse-Drawn Carriages in
New York City and Horses Without Carriages
International have written to Cincinnati
Mayor Mark Mallory and the Cincinnati City
Council urging them to ban horse-drawn carriages.
The letter follows two accidents involving
horse carriages in one week.
The first, on December 24, involved a
carriage horse who became frightened due to a
loud noise and bolted, causing his carriage
to flip over.
The horse ran through Hyde Park Square before
being captured and calmed by a bystander. The
driver suffered facial injuries. The second
accident occurred only two days later on
December 26 when a car rear-ended a carriage
on a suspension bridge. The carriage driver
suffered serious head injuries. The carriage
was mangled. The horse appeared to be OK.
"Horse drawn carriages do not belong in heavy
city traffic," said Elizabeth Forel,
president of the New York group.
"They are open, flimsy and unsafe. Accidents
involving these slow-moving conveyances have
caused serious injuries and fatalities to
horses, drivers, passengers, pedestrians and
motorists.
"At 1200 to 1500 pounds, carriage horses are
unpredictable, unwitting weapons. As prey
animals, they are very fearful and spook
easily - at a loud noise, a rustling leaf, an
unusual situation."
The Coalition to Ban Horse-Drawn Carriages
began their campaign in New York in 2006 to
ask the Mayor and council to ban the
horse-carriage industry in that city.
In 2008, it joined with other organisations
and activists around the world to create
Horses Without Carriages International, a
global initiative that includes the campaigns
in Philadelphia, Boston, Chicago, Rome,
Vienna and Dublin, all seeking to bring an
end to the horse carriage trade in their cities.
It is hoped that these cities will soon join
with a growing number of municipalities that
have already banned the horse-drawn carriage
tourist trade. They include Santa Fe, New
Mexico; and Camden, New Jersey; Biloxi,
Mississippi; Palm Beach, Panama City, Key
West, Deerfield Beach, and Pompano Beach,
Florida, as well as London, Paris, Oxford,
Beijing and Toronto.
Just this past year, Tel Aviv banned
carthorses from their city and New Delhi in
India banned carriage horses.
Forel hopes the accidents will be a wake-up
call to the people of Cincinnati.
"It is cruel to exploit horses for economic
greed involving small industries and we urge
the mayor and City Council to act now to
prevent future accidents."
ELECTRIC CARS VS CARRIAGE HORSES
momentum all over the world
The idea of substituting carriage horses with
electric cars is a concept that is being seen
throughout the world as people are getting
more sensitized to horse suffering. Even in
Austria, a carriage with an electric assist
helps the horses go up hills. We, of course,
prefer a total ban. We are not opposed to
electric cars taking the place of horse-drawn
carriages in NYC - but it MUST NOT BE A PHASE
OUT. Mixing new strange looking car
contraptions with horses in an already
congested area is a huge, thoughtless mistake
for many reasons, which we enumerated in a
previous newsletter. To anyone who really
cares about and understands horses, a total
ban must come first.
"Never doubt that a small group of
thoughtful, committed citizens can change the
world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever
has." Margaret Mead.
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Thank you for caring about the horses,
Elizabeth Forel - Coalition to Ban
Horse-Drawn Carriages - a standing committee
of The Coalition for New York City Animals,
Inc.
Please DONATE
to our campaign to ban
the inhumane and unsafe carriage horse industry.
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As reported to you last week, the Department of Health and Mental Hygiene has proposed updates and modifications to 
About.com - January 7, 2010 - 
From - The Animal Law Coalition -