Coalition to Ban Horse-Drawn Carriages

Press Release -- Coalition to Ban Horse-Drawn Carriages

For Immediate Release
NYC, Thursday, 7/15/10    

Contact:  Edita Birnkrant, Friends of Animals - 917-xxx-xxxx   
edita@friendsofanimals.org

Elizabeth Forel, Coalition to Ban Horse-Drawn Carriages -  
917-xxx-xxxx --   coalitionbanhdc@gmail.com

  

Workers who believe that the City’s carriage horses have it better than they do have mistakenly compared their plight – no sick-day pay – to the much beleaguered and exploited carriage horses.  Buying into the media hype this past April, which touted the “five-week vacation” for horses, workers demanded that they be treated as well as the carriage horses.

 The truth is that carriage horses are forced by law to work nine hours a day, seven days a week  confined between the shafts of their carriages, wearing blinders.  They stand on scorching hot asphalt under the blazing sun with no shade on the hack line.  They live in stalls that are less than half what experts recommend, on the upper floors in the warehouse like stables on the far west side of Manhattan.

“Horses are not people” said Elizabeth Forel, President of the Coalition to Ban Horse-Drawn Carriages.  “While a five-week vacation would be welcomed by most people, it is a human concept.  Horses are herd animals who need daily turnout to pasture – something they never get in NYC. “

“This bogus bill, signed into law by Mayor Bloomberg in April, was a shameful claim to helping the horses,” said Edita Birnkrant, New York Director of  Friends of Animals.  “In fact, it was opposed by every animal protection group in NYC.  The bill’s main purpose was a rate increase for the drivers.  It did not help the horses at all. “   

 Forel continues “Our recent rescue of a NYC carriage horse from the slaughter auctions in Pennsylvania came as a result of the horse being sent to a “farm” for his “vacation” according to a New York Times article.”     

Said Birnkrant “We fully support the effort of these workers to receive sick pay, but it is misguided to portray the exploitative carriage-horse industry as any kind of model for what they are trying to achieve.  The horses forced to pull carriages in NYC live a life of misery, and that's nothing to cheer about."

 For more information about the bogus legislation referred to here -
 See our Youtube video

###

 

To honor
Bobby II Freedom
previously known as Billy
ID# 2873 rescued by the Coalition to Ban Horse-Drawn Carriages and Equine Advocates on June 25, 2010 from the New Holland auctions.

In memory of
Lilly Rose O'Reilly
previously known
as Dada ID# 2711
R.I.P.August, 2007