Ballot Initiative
Sun Tallahassee Bureau
"Groups rage against caging pregnant pigs"
By GARY FINEOUT
TALLAHASSEE -- Florida voters in recent years have been asked to ban the use
of nets in saltwater fishing, make English the official language, open up the
state for casino gambling and limit the terms of legislators. And maybe
coming to a ballot in 2002: A constitutional amendment to ban the confinement
of pregnant pigs.
Even though Florida is not a major producer of pork for the
nation, animal rights groups are using the state's ballot initiative process
in an effort to make the Sunshine State the first to ban so called "gestation
cages" that confine sows.
The groups, which include the Humane Society of the
United States, have quietly gathered enough signatures to trigger an
automatic legal review by the state Supreme Court. The groups also have
raised in excess of $200,000 -- including $50,000 from the wife of the
Houston Rockets owner -- for their campaign to "limit cruel and inhumane
confinement of pigs during pregnancy."
Animal rights activists acknowledge
that Florida -- which isn't ranked by the federal government among the 17
largest pork producing states -- doesn't have a large amount of farms that
use the confinement cages. But they say they are seeking a ban before it
happens, saying that the cages are inhumane because they are so small that
pigs can't fully lie down or even turn around in them. Most cages are 7 feet
long and 2 feet wide.
The European Union recently voted to phase out the use
of the cages over the next several years.
"It's a preemptive strike against
large corporate hog farms," said Wayne Pacelle, senior vice president of the
Humane Society of the United States. "We are doing the initiative to prevent
future suffering for pigs that would face this confinement technique in
Florida, but also to prevent huge factory farms from taking root in Florida."
The state's largest agricultural organization, however, says the real goal of
the ballot initiative is to attract publicity and money for the animal rights
groups.
Pat Cockrell, director of agricultural policy for the Florida Farm
Bureau Foundation in Gainesville, said the state has fewer than 100
commercial pig farms and that probably only "half a dozen" use the "gestation
cages." "It is a cynical, one might say greasy, attempt by national animal
rights groups that would lard up our state's constitution in order to advance
a national agenda and perhaps to fatten those organization's treasuries,"
Cockrell said. "We think this is a ploy."
The official organization that is
seeking the petition signatures is called Floridians for Humane Farms and is
based in Pompano Beach. But the backbone of the group has come from the
Humane Society, New York-based Farm Sanctuary Inc., and Animal Rights
Foundation of Florida.
Farm Sanctuary Inc. has given $110,000 so far for the
campaign, state records show, while London-based Compassion in World Farming
has contributed $16,000.
Nanci Alexander, the president of Animal Rights
Foundation and a Boca Raton resident, has donated $50,000 for the campaign.
Alexander is the wife of Leslie Alexander, the owner of the Houston Rockets
basketball franchise.
Those same campaign records show that the effort has
just two paid staff members. But they have been successful enough in reaching
out to volunteers since they launched their campaign late last year.
Organizers have officially gathered 55,000 signatures -- more than enough to
trigger the legal review. Pacelle says the groups -- which are using
volunteers to gather petition signatures -- now have up to 140,000
signatures. They will need nearly 489,000 signatures in order to qualify for
the November 2002 ballot.
Attorney General Bob Butterworth on Thursday asked
the state Supreme Court to look at the proposed amendment and see whether it
meets state laws on ballot initiatives.
Butterworth did not give his opinion,
but he did raise questions as to whether the amendment could apply to the
owners of a single pig since "farm" is defined to mean any land, building or
support facility used in the production of food. "The proposed amendment
would apply, for example, to a chicken farmer who had a single pregnant pet
pig," Butterworth wrote.
