For residents of Denver, Colorado, the presidential election wasn’t the only important measure on the ballot.
Ordinance 309, a referendum ordinance that would have closed down Superior Farms, a Denver slaughterhouse, failed by a wide margin. About 65% of voters rejected the ballot measure, which would have also prevented similar businesses from opening in the city. The ballot measure that was sponsored by an animal-rights group, Pro-Animal Future, only garnered about 36% of the vote. It faced wide opposition from agricultural interests, unions and both political parties. Superior Farms is a major lamb slaughtering facility responsible for between 15% and 20% of lamb slaughter for the entire country that processes about 1,500 sheep each day. Its closure would have cost the city about 160 direct jobs and affected 2,700 jobs of ranchers, distributors, grocers and butchers, analysts estimated.
Colorado has another large lamb-processing facility in the small town of Brush, northeast of Denver and 21 smaller slaughterhouses around the state. Closing the Denver facility could have forced producers to send their lambs to slaughterhouses in other states or stop producing. ” They’re losers. And we’re winners,” Superior Farms CEO Rick Stott told local media in contrasting the proponents and opponents of the ordinance. A companion ordinance that would have banned the manufacturing display and sale of certain fur products, also failed.
David Murray can be reached at [email protected].
