Get Involved

Action Alerts & Updates

New Ballot Initiative to Protect Farm Animals Launches in Ohio

Over the last several years, thanks to the tireless efforts of our members and supporters, Farm Sanctuary has helped pass some of the most important reforms in the history of the farm animal protection movement. We helped ban gestation crates in Florida, gestation crates and veal crates in Arizona, and most recently in California, gestation crates, veal crates and battery cages. Anti-confinement legislation has caught on all over the country: The legislatures in Oregon, Colorado, Maine, and Michigan have all banned one or more of these cruel confinement systems, and similar bills are pending in other states. In 2010, we have set our sights on passing the most sweeping initiative yet.

Working with the Humane Society of the United States, Ohio SPCA, Toledo Area Humane Society, Geauga Humane Society, Ohio League of Humane Voters, Center for Food Safety, United Farm Workers, Consumer Federation of America, Center for Science in the Public Interest, and a growing list of organizations, we will be gathering signatures in the months ahead to bring real change to Ohio. 

This measure will allow Ohio voters to provide guidance to the newly enacted Livestock Board and set certain minimum humane standards that will prevent cruel factory farming practices in Ohio, including:

• Extreme confinement in tiny cages for months on end: Tens of thousands of veal calves, 170,000 breeding pigs, and approximately 27 million egg-laying hens in Ohio are confined in cages and crates so restrictive the animals can barely move an inch for virtually their whole lives. Many don’t even have enough room to stretch their limbs or turn around. (Learn more about Farm Sanctuary’s Anti-Confinement Campaign.)

• Allowing “downer cattle” to enter the human food chain: Allowing sick and injured animals into the food supply threatens public health and food safety. Cattle too sick or injured to stand or walk on their own to slaughter should be humanely euthanized, not inhumanely dragged or pushed while being shocked and beaten onto the kill floor to be used for human consumption. (Learn more about Farm Sanctuary’s No Downers Campaign.)

• Inhumane methods of euthanasia for sick and injured animals: In Ohio, a factory farmer was videotaped killing sick pigs by hanging them execution-style from a tractor, leaving them to writhe in the air for minutes on end. He was acquitted of cruelty for the hangings, a verdict Ohio’s agribusiness community hailed as a “huge victory,” because Ohio has no law specifically requiring humane farm animal euthanasia methods.

Right now, your help is critical to bringing the next ballot initiative to protect farm animals to Ohio. Undoubtedly, the road ahead will not be easy. Factory farm interests will use every means available to them to preserve the status quo and continue engaging in egregiously cruel practices.

We have just five months to collect more than 600,000 signatures. That’s a lot of work, but in California we collected more than 800,000 signatures in the same time period – because of volunteers like you. Together, we can do this!

Here are some important ways that you can get involved:

• Register to attend a petitioning kick-off party near you.
• Join the campaign and find out how you can help collect signatures at www.ohiohumane.com.
• *VERY IMPORTANT* Sign up for our e-news and action alerts for updates about this historic effort, and ask others to do the same! And, if you want to get even more active in this campaign, be sure to sign up for our Advocacy Campaign Team to learn about additional opportunities to take action.
• If you live outside of Ohio, please alert any friends, family and colleagues you have in the state to this initiative and help us build the network and team we need for a successful campaign to pass this measure. Click on the “Share this” link below to e-mail this page or share with your social networks!