Animal Rights Group Urges City Council To Fast-Track Carriage Ban

HELL’S KITCHEN, NY — The group of local activists looking to remove carriage horses off the streets of New York City is calling on City Council Speaker Corey Johnson to expedite legislation that would ban the use of horse-drawn transportation.

New Yorkers for Clean, Livable Safe Streets (NYCLASS) said in a statement Tuesday that it is seeking the city council to fast-track hearings and legislation after images of an allegedly malnourished horse with an open wound surfaced last week. The animal rights group held a rally last week in which volunteers and other activists protested the continued use of the carriages.

The images of the injured horse drew the attention of Johnson, who tweeted last week that the photos that circulated on social media last week are “disturbing to say the least.”

“We can’t allow this abuse to continue,” Johnson tweeted.

In its call for action on Tuesday, NYCLASS officials said that after “years of broken promises”, New York Mayor Bill de Blasio and the city’s department of health have failed to act. That has prompted the activism group to seek action from the city council, the group said.

"Speaker Johnson was right when he said 'we can't let this abuse continue.' But after eight years of lip service and broken promises from city leaders, the neglect and abuse of carriage horses is worse than ever, and the time for action is long overdue,” Edita Birnkrant, executive director of NYCLASS said in Tuesday’s statement. “Cities across the world have replaced horse carriages with electric vehicles and other safe, humane forms of transportation, while New York continues to do nothing but sanction animal abuse, vehicle crashes, horse collapses, and deaths.

“The city must hold hearings and fast-track legislation to permanently stop the rampant abuse of the unaccountable horse carriage industry.”

Pete Donohue, the spokesman for Transport Workers of America and TWU Local 100, questioned the motives of groups like NYCLASS, who, he said, blatantly mischaracterizes the cases involving horses used in the city's carriage industry and often distorts the truth about the situation.

He said that the horse that was shown with a non-infected wound the size of a quarter had undergone its annual physical just a week prior to the photos coming to light and had been deemed healthy by a veterinarian.

At last week’s rally, activists held posters that included the images of the carriage horse with open wounds that the group said was forced to work in the heat. Activists also held yellow police tape, that included the words, “Crime scene do not cross.”

Donohue called the characterization of the industry being criminal "ridiculous" and instead said that the carriage industry is the most regulated and scrutinized.

"The notion that these blue-collar workers who are working with horses and who love horses are in the shadows and not under government scrutiny, torturing and abusing animals, is absolutely ridiculous," Donohue told Patch on Wednesday.

He added: "There's a million eyes on these horses and when there's a complaint (the city) is going to investigate and we're not going to support or defend abuse. ...it would be economic suicide (for the carriage operators) to mistreat these animals and treat them poorly."

In 2019, legislation was passed that prohibits carriage drivers from working their steeds in 90-degree temperatures or in 80-degree temperatures with an equine heat index exceeding 150. The equine heat index is calculated by taking the sum of the temperature and the relative humidity, according to the legislation.

Advocates for the bill said at the time the bill will keep horses out of dangerous working conditions, but detractors say it's another misguided attempt by city officials to put an end to the carriage industry. The bill will be especially harmful during the carriage industry's peak summer season, driver and industry spokesperson Christina Hansen said at the time.

The Mayor has remained a vocal critic of the city’s carriage horse industry. Last year, after video of a carriage horse collapsing surfaced and the horse had to be euthanized, de Blasio said he was disgusted by the footage.

“Why are these poor animals still being forced to work on the streets of America's largest city so a few humans can profit,” the mayor tweeted last year, according to CNN. “This needs to end. When laws condone the inhumane, change them!"

Donohue, however, said that the horses used in the carriage industry have been bred to be around people and to pull things. The horses work in a Central Park environment that was designed for horses, which makes it safe for the long-standing tradition of horse-drawn carriages to continue.

According to TWU Local 100 President Tony Utano, more than 100,000 horses are slaughtered every year because they don't have anyone willing or financially able to take care of them. The Central Park horses have a purpose, a sustainable job, providing green tours of the park that helps pay for their food, shelter and medical care.

"If horses don't belong in an 843-acre pastoral setting, where do they belong?,"Donohue said Wednesday. "Horses are spending the day in the park...they take short trips to and from the stables. They're not out there in traffic five, six, seven hours a day. They're in Central Park.

"It's lunacy to say horses don't belong in Central Park."