Ourview

By:

Shandra Jordan

Chris Ortiz

Colleen Buhrer

Tom Martino’s report in November that CSU indirectly sells

horses to slaughterhouses understandably upset many viewers and put

the equine science program under intense scrutiny. Certainly it

seems that any school as dedicated to animal welfare as CSU (the

No. 2 veterinary school in the country and home to one of the top

animal cancer centers) would want to take precautions that animals

students have benefited from are treated well in the next part of

their lives. But we have no doubts that nobody at CSU was

heartlessly selling these animals with the intent that they wind up

at a slaughterhouse.

CSU has to sell these animals. A state law requires CSU to sell

off their assets and return the money to the state. Even without

this law, the university can’t feed a horse forever when a horse

can live up to 35 years, much less house every horse that comes

through CSU. At some point CSU has to place good faith in any

middlemen buyers that they will make every effort to find a home

for the horses before turning to slaughterhouses.

Any institution that works with animals potentially faces the

problem of what to do with the animals when it is done with them.

In this case, we feel assured that CSU made the best effort it

could under the circumstances to take care of these horses through

advertising the auction and looking for new options.