Voters snub proposals to ban slaughterhouses and fur sales

Activist-driven ballot measures were shot down by voters in Colorado and California on Nov. 5.

In Denver, citizens rejected Ordinance 309, which would have banned processing plants in the city limits, and Ordinance 308, which would have banned the sale of new fur in the city. Both measures were proposed by Pro-Animal Future.

Ordinance 309, titled “Prohibition of Slaughterhouses,” sought to ban the construction, operation, or maintenance of meat processing facilities in Denver starting Jan. 1, 2026. One employee-owned plant in Denver processes around 20% of U.S. lamb.

Along with colleagues, Dawn Thilmany, an agricultural economist with Colorado State University and director of the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Rocky Mountain and Northwest Food Business Center, published a study suggesting the ban would disrupt regional meat supply chains.

The study concluded potential cost to the local community could be anywhere from $215 million to $860 million a year in economic activity.

Stop and think of all the jobs that could be impacted by such a ban. Not only farmers and ranchers who raise the livestock, but truckers, distributors, retailers, butchers, restaurant owners and their employees would have all been at risk of losing their jobs and, for some, their businesses.

Interestingly, regarding Ordinance 308, there are fewer than five businesses in Denver that sell any new fur products. In 2021, Boulder passed a similar ban.

Pro-Animal Future hoped to set a precedent in Denver, making the passing of a statewide fur ban in Colorado more feasible in the future.

In Sonoma County, California, 85% of voters opposed Measure J, proposed by the Coalition to End Factory Farming. The measure would have banned concentrated animal feeding operations, or CAFOs, and forced 21 farms to shut down.

A study from California State University in Chino concluded Measure J would have cost local workers around $80 million in wages and raised unemployment in the county by 13%.

Well-funded, anti-animal-agriculture extremist groups sneak into our local communities with a bucketful of misinformation about how we treat our farm animals. They bring in out-of-state dollars and supporters to further the anti-animal-agriculture agenda.

If you think for a split second they will stop with the low-hanging fruit, you are wrong — they try to set precedent. Animal rights activists believe that animals have the same rights as humans.

Sara Amundson, chief government relations officer for the Humane Society of the U.S. and president of the Humane Society Legislative Fund, wrote in her Oct. 31 blog: “In the U.S., politics determine the day-to-day, lived reality of both people and animals. And animal protection is always on the ballot in some way, in daily discourse and practice, in public policy discussion and in our legislatures.

“These ballot initiatives, like the opportunity to elect humane-minded candidates, give us power — the power to change our laws and make this a better world for all animals.”

What can you do? Start the conversation with friends, neighbors and family. Be proactive.

Build relationships with representatives at all levels of government. Be accessible to answer questions.

More important than anything else, just do the right thing on your farm every single day.