Mary
S. Nash
NashHulme@msn.com
www.KaufmanZoning.net
972-962-7706
Mr.
Paul Burka
Dear
Mr. Burka:
I
heard a rumor that you are working on the “best and worst”
My nominations
for worst legislators are Bloody Betty
Brown (R-Terrell), primary sponsor of the Texas Live Horse Slaughter Bill,
HB 1324; and secondary sponsors Charlie
Geren (R-Fort Worth) and Sid Miller
(R-Stephenville). HB 1324 would
de-criminalize the illegal activities of Texas’s two live horse slaughter
plants, Beltex in Fort Worth, and Dallas Crown in Kaufman where young, healthy
horses are stunned with bolts through their brains, strung up by one hind leg,
and have their throats slit so their beating hearts can pump the blood from
their bodies. This process is
mandated by the United States Department of Agriculture for slaughter of animals
intended for human consumption. Then
they cut off their legs and heads, which I am told are sold to zoos, and the
horses’ torsos are frozen and shipped overseas out of
Meanwhile,
from our little 40 acre farm next to Dallas Crown, I see beautiful, fat, young
Arabians, Quarterhorses, and Dunns waiting for slaughter, like the ones in this
photo taken at Dallas Crown on Sep 1, 2002.
On
Aug 7, 2002, Texas Attorney General John Cornyn issued an opinion
letter saying it is a crime to sell, possess, or transport horse meat for human
consumption, even if the consumption takes place outside the U.S.
See text of opinion letter at http://www.oag.state.tx.us/opinopen/opinions/op49cornyn/jc-0539.htm.
The only two live horse slaughter plants in the
On
Feb 26, 2003 my State Representative, Bloody Betty Brown, responded to all this by filing HB 1324 which
would grant legal status to the only two remaining live horse slaughter plants
in the United States of America.
Bloody
Betty Brown
made a statement at the Ag Committee hearing on March 25 that
Bloody
Betty also
said that the Texas & Southwestern
Cattle Raisers Association guard against stolen horses being slaughtered
because they have brand inspectors at the two plants who “check each horse.”
What Ms. Brown forgot to find
out is whether or not the two brand inspectors have actually found any stolen
horses.
In an April 11 email message to me, TSCRA Director Todd McCartney wrote,
2)
The # of horses reported stolen to TSCRA is not a figure I can get my hands on
easily. It is not a figure we use, so it is not an item totaled in
our database. It could be discovered but only by man hours reading
summary reports submitted by each one of our 31 officers.
3)
As I mentioned to you on the phone, we do know the # of horses recovered by
TSCRA law officers ...but not the location of their recovery. In the last
10 years (1992-2002) we recovered 1,024 stolen horses. Since we started
inspecting horses at the two plants we have recovered 837. However, we
can't pull up how many of those were apprehended at the plants. Again, that
would take man hours to discover. It is simply not a number that is totaled.
See
http://kaufmanzoning.net/horsemeat/McCartneytoNash1.htm
State
Representative Charlie Howard (R-Sugarland) had his horses stolen, and he says
they ended up being slaughtered. It
made him mad, so in 1997 he supported legislation that mandates $3 for every
horse slaughtered in
total
number of horses slaughtered in recent years at the two plants is:
2000 35,630
2001 38,750
2002 40,336
No
wonder the Texas & Southwestern
Cattle Raisers Association sent Zach Brady to testify in favor of Bloody Betty’s HB 1324 before the House Ag Committee on March 25.
And veterinarian Steve Hicks of Palestine said he had a letter from Dr.
Ted Friend, Texas A&M, saying he is in favor of live horse slaughter too.
Money works wonders on attitudes toward live horse slaughter in
Bloody
Betty
laments that jobs would be lost and economies spoiled if the plants closed.
At the Dallas Crown plant site they slaughtered cattle before they
slaughtered horses, and they could do that again.
I understand that Beltex slaughters other animals besides horses, and
they could slaughter cattle too.
Lots
of folks have speculated that Bloody
Betty is receiving some benefit from the $40 million a year Belgian/French
Texas live horse slaughter business that supplies horsemeat to
On
April 23 I sat in the visitors’ gallery of the Texas House of Representatives
while Bloody Betty’s Republican
friends lined up at the east podium to feed her fodder while she blathered on
about the virtues of live horse slaughter. I
could not believe my ears when I first heard the canned sound of a horse’s
whinny. Then I heard it again….and
again. There were lots of snickers
and laughter, especially from Fred Brown (R-College Station).
I was embarrassed to be a Texan, but proud to be a Democrat.
Sixty Republicans voted in favor of HB 1324; 19 voted against it.
Twenty-one Democrats voted in favor; 36 voted no.
My
nominations for best legislators are
Steve Wolens (D-Dallas) and Toby
Goodman (R-Arlington) who gallantly tried to stop HB 1324 on the floor of
the Texas House of Representatives on
Bloody
Betty Brown’s
live horse slaughter bill, HB 1324, now awaits action by the Senate Ag
subcommittee.
The
40 acre farm next to Dallas Crown in Kaufman has been in my family for 150
years. I see the horses after
they're unloaded
from double decker cattle haulers, and I see them milling around in their
holding pens. When the wind is from
the west and I’m standing in my backyard in Kaufman, I smell the stench of 150
dead horses.
Enclosed
is a list of the killer-buyers who supply horses to
Dallas Crown.
Sincerely,
Encl.