de blasio
Anti-Horse-Carriage Lobby Group Fined
NYCLASS, a group that has lobbied intensively to ban horse drawn carriages from the streets of New York City, has agreed to pay a fine for violating campaign finance rules. The group has admitted to making illegal contributions last year to two City Council candidates, both of whom were elected. Earlier this year, the Daily News disclosed that a political consultant for NYCLASS threatened to undermine Christine Quinn’s mayoral campaign if she didn’t back the carriage horse ban. In April, 2013, Quinn, who was leading her opponent—the now Mayor de Blasio—in the polls at the time, refused to back the ban. NYCLASS responded by contributing more than $400,000 to a PAC formed by NYCLASS’s political consultant to carry out the “Anybody But Quinn” campaign. Records also show that two of de Blasio’s top financial supporters gave $225,000 to NYCLASS. With Mayor de Blasio now having sent proposed legislation to ban the carriages to the New York City Council, that body—which includes the two successful candidates who received illegal funds from NYCLASS—will be deciding on the fate of the horse carriages and their drivers. De Blasio said on Tuesday that he intends to personally lobby City Council members to pass the ban. Dirty business, all under the syrupy guise of “Free the Horses; Stop the Abuse.” Posted December 12, 2014
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NYC Horse Carriages a Campaign Issue in the State
Republican Congressman Michael Grimm—notwithstanding his endorsement by HSUS’s Humane Society Legislative Fund—doesn’t support Mayor de Blasio’s pledge to ban horse-drawn carriages in New York City. “I don’t think we should ban the carriages. The only thing we should mandate is that the horses are treated well and treated humanely,” Grimm told the New York Observer. Grimm, who is challenged in the election by Democratic candidate Dominic Recchia, Jr., opined that the issue is purely political and not a matter of animal welfare as liberal Democratic Mayor de Blasio and animal rights groups have insisted. The stables, put to other uses, would be financially beneficial to developers, Grimm suggested. Mayor de Blasio did not return the Observer’s request for comment. Click for more details in Ross Barkan’s article. Posted October 14, 2014
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They Just Don’t Get It
Karen L. Myers photoThere are numerous unrelated constituencies roiling the pot in the New York City horse carriage controversy, and all of them—from stakeholders to politicians to the news media—express strong opinions on one side or another.
There are the animal rights activists who don’t believe animals should work, real estate developers who see big profits in renewing the stable property for higher-income use, politicians elected with the help of large donations from those who would ban the carriages, carriage drivers who are threatened with loss of livelihood, tourists and romantics who feel that iconic images of New York City should be preserved, and true horse people who are saddened to see any traditional horse activity lost to contemporary life. It’s the latter group that is the least understood.
