The front page of the Vancouver Sun lets us know that sad news for a calf has turned into good news for many more, as the Cloverdale rodeo has banned calf-roping. The story below presents a perfect opportunity for letters against the abuse of animals for human entertainment. The Vancouver Sun takes letters at http://www.canada.com/vancouversun/letters.html
The Vancouver Sun (British Columbia)
May 23, 2007 Wednesday
Rodeo bans all roping events; Cloverdale board makes decision after calf breaks leg and is destroyed
Nicholas Read, With files from Kelly Sinoski, Vancouver Sun
NEWS; Pg. A1
The Cloverdale rodeo is the first in Canada to ban calf-roping contests, a controversial event that's attracted animal rights protesters to the fairgrounds for years.
The move means the 61-year-old rodeo will no longer be sanctioned by the Canadian Professional Rodeo Association, which insists all sanctioned rodeos include roping events.
The ban came after a calf was euthanized when its leg was broken in Saturday's tie-down roping competition, the Cloverdale Rodeo Association said Tuesday.
The calf was injured when it was lassoed by a cowboy. It was then carried out of the ring and was put down by a veterinarian.
"We felt as a board of agricultural people -- as an association of agricultural people -- that we didn't want this to ever happen again," association spokeswoman Laura Ballance said of the death.
So, starting next year, the rodeo, one of the five largest in Canada and a mainstay of the Victoria Day weekend in the Lower Mainland, will no longer include calf roping, team roping, steer wrestling, or wild cow milking.
What the decision means to rodeo participants, Ballance said, is that when they win contests at Cloverdale in future, they will no longer be able to accrue points towards an overall Canadian title.
She likened it to "a team jumping out of the NHL and going its own way."
Instead, future Cloverdale rodeos will include only saddle bronc riding, bareback riding, barrel racing, and bull riding.
But CPRA president Dale Leschiutta said that may not be the case. He said the CPRA board would consider the Cloverdale decision at a meeting on June 4, and depending on what the board decides, Cloverdale may continue to be sanctioned even without the roping events.
"We have special events in our association that allows for us to look at these situations and decide whether it's a good thing to go with the sanctioning or not," Leschiutta said.
Ballance said the association, in conjunction with Surrey Mayor Dianne Watts, approached the CPRA with a view to changing some of the rules around roping events -- including introduction of a breakaway rope -- following the death of an animal in 2004 in the steer-wrestling event.
But when the CPRA refused, the association felt it had no choice but to discontinue them.
"Now, that we've had a second accident, we've decided in Cloverdale 2007, we're never going to have this again," Ballance said.
Leschiutta said he hopes some arrangement can be made to keep Cloverdale within the CPRA fold.
Watts, who as a member of the rodeo board for eight years, had been involved in negotiations with the CPRA since the death of the steer in 2004, said she "absolutely" endorsed the rodeo's decision, saying: "I think it's time things were brought into the 21st century.
"When the calf had to be put down this past weekend, it was strongly felt that we could no longer wait for [the CPRA] to make a decision -- that we needed to take a progressive stand and take things into our own hands."
Watts, who also is a member of the B.C. SPCA and has met many times with the Vancouver Humane Society to discuss rodeo cruelty, also said she was confident the revised rodeo would include the events spectators most want to see.
"I think the rodeo that will be built from today forward will be very exciting," she said.
However, she played down any suggestions she was the driving force behind the decision.
"This was the association's decision," Watts said. "They should get the credit for it."
Surrey Coun. Marvin Hunt, a longtime supporter of the rodeo, also said it was the right thing to do, and that despite appearances to the contrary, it was not an overnight decision.
Since the 2004 death of the steer "we've been trying to work on it behind the scenes and within the organization," Hunt said.
"There's certainly times you have to sit there and look at the realities of things and say 'hey, maybe it's time for us to be moving into the 21st century' and some of these events have a challenge to them."
However, he said a number of council members, including Watts and himself were present when the calf was hurt on Saturday, and that was the tipping point.
This was in sharp contrast to 2004, after the last animal died, when Hunt dismissed animal welfare advocates as being unfamiliar "with the care and the effort that goes into raising rodeo animals."
On the death of the steer in 2004, Hunt said: "Airplanes do crash and people get killed in crosswalks. At the rodeo, guys get beat up by the bulls; they get stomped on. Those are the realities of life."
A request made to the Cloverdale Rodeo and Exhibition Association to speak to another board member was refused. Instead all questions were referred to Ballance, an employee of Curve Communications, a Vancouver-based communications agency.
Attendance was down for this year's rodeo because of bad weather, Ballance said, but she insisted the event is popular and not losing money. This year about 17,000 people attended over three days compared to previous highs of up to 22,000.
She also couldn't say how many animals have been killed in total at the rodeo.
"I don't think there's anybody who knows going back," she said. "It's not like today when detailed records are kept."
Each year, the City of Surrey pays the rodeo association $180,000 to run and operate the grounds and buildings on the fairgrounds, land which the city owns.
Vancouver Humane Society executive director Debra Probert, who's been campaigning against rodeo cruelty since 1989, was "ecstatic" about the announcement.
"I think this decision shows that the Cloverdale Rodeo is admitting what the Vancouver Humane Society and the humane community have been saying for over 20 years -- that these events are explicitly cruel and that there's no place for them in a progressive society."
However, she couldn't promise the announcement would put an end to future VHS protests.
"That's an issue for our board to decide," Probert said. "The other events -- although not as explicitly cruel -- are still based on the exploitation of animals' reactions to pain, fear and stress, so there's no way we could condone the rodeo even after these changes."
"Wow, that's wonderful," said Marcie Moriarty, B.C. SPCA general manager of cruelty, when told of the news.
"I can say that we're definitely pleased with the steps the rodeo is taking. We feel these events have the most potential for animal injuries and animals being in distress, so it's a step in the right direction."
nread@png.canwest.com
EVENTS DROPPED
Events that will be discontinued from the Cloverdale Rodeo:
Tie-down roping: A mounted cowboy lassoes a calf, throws it on its back and ties it up in the least amount of time.
Team roping: Two mounted cowboys attempt to rope and immobilize a full-grown steer in the least amount of time.
Wild cow milking: A cow is cut from the herd and roped. Two riders dismount and grab the cow around the neck/head and attempt to hold her while the last rider attempts to extract a small amount of milk from the cow's udder into a bottle.
Steer wrestling: A steer is released from a chute while a mounted cowboy chases it. The cowboy wrestles the animal to the ground by twisting its horns.
(End of Vancouver Sun article.)
------------
(DawnWatch is an animal advocacy media watch that looks at animal issues in the media and facilitates one-click responses to the relevant media outlets. You can learn more about it, and sign up for alerts at http://www.DawnWatch.com. You may forward or reprint DawnWatch alerts if you do so unedited -- leave DawnWatch in the title and include this parenthesized tag line. If somebody forwards DawnWatch alerts to you, which you enjoy, please help the list grow by signing up. It is free.)
To discontinue DawnWatch alerts go to http://www.DawnWatch.com/nothanks.php
----------------------------------------
You are subscribed to DawnWatch Canada using the following address:
example@example.com
Date: Wed May 23 21:18:42 2007
