Miami-Dade Residents: Help Dogs and Horses
(here’s an approximation of what you’ll see):
OFFICIAL SPECIAL ELECTION BALLOT MIAMI-DADE COUNTY, FLORIDA JANUARY 29, 2008
County Question No. 1
Miami-Dade Home Rule Charter Amendment Relating to the Qualifying Dates for Certain County Elected OfficesShall the Charter be amended to move the candidate qualifying period for certain Miami-Dade County elected offices three weeks earlier, in accordance with State law?
YES 40
NO 41County Question No. 2
Home Rule Charter Amendment Changing Property Appraiser from an Appointed to an Elected OfficeShall the Charter be amended to provide for the transfer of the duties of the County Property Appraiser from a person appointed and supervised by the Mayor to a person elected and subject to recall by the voters?
YES 43
NO 44County Question No. 3
Slot Machines Limited to Existing Horse and Dog Tracks and Jai Alai FrontonsYES 46
NO 47
Vote NO . . . . . 47
If gambling doesn’t expand, the dog and horse racing industries will continue to die. The track owners know this to be true, so they’re pushing hard to add slots wherever they can. The owner of the Flagler Dog Track has told the Miami Herald, ”Our goal is to keep this place operating until we get slots." It’s crucial to not allow slots and allow the market to speak for itself. The reality is that the people have already spoken, and they don’t want to continue to see dogs used, injured, maimed and slaughtered for the profit of the track and dog owners.
Florida has a hideous record of flagrant abuse of dogs, not including the 20 hours or more spent in a cage lying on newspaper clippings and often muzzled (though I must say it doesn’t hold a candle to Tucson’s outrageous behavior, which includes dogs disappearing into the ether).
For those new to this issue, here’s the story, as stated by www.greyhoundracingsucks.com:
One of the biggest obstacles to ending greyhound racing is that the greyhound racing industry is aggressively lobbying to bring slot machines and/or video gambling into many tracks throughout the country. Although interest in dog racing has been in steady decline over the last 10 years, the addition of these machines will enable track owners to fill the tracks with presumably a different group people who are simply interested in casino style gambling. With this scenario, the greyhounds become a side show that people really don’t care about but must exist in order for the tracks to stay open and house the extremely lucrative video gambling & slot machines.
You may wonder, why not just get rid of the dog racing and just let them have the slot machines? The most logical reasons for continuing to operate the live dog racing part of the business are (a) because the tracks are only licensed as pari-mutuel facilities and must have live dog racing, and (b) the presence of live dog racing makes the idea of video gambling and slot machines much more palatable for politicians and the state legislature which may be reluctant to support an outright casino, but think dog racing is harmless and fun. Basically these poor dogs are being bred and killed in droves for the sole reason of enabling track owners to further enrich themselves by entering into the lucrative business of slot machine and video gambling.
The most frightening thing is that if the tracks are allowed to introduce casino style gambling, and the state starts getting its cut of the profit, it will be nearly impossible to end dog racing in that state. It is much easier to encourage lawmakers to get rid of dog racing because it is cruel and inhumane AND it is failing economically. If this additional type of gambling is introduced, it will be very difficult to convince a state government desperately in need of revenue, to get rid of a lucrative, tax paying, gambling business.
Go to Grey2kUSA.org for more.
Race cars, not dogs.
