Denver, Let’s Leave Slaughter Behind.
Industrial slaughterhouses are inhumane to workers, animals, and the surrounding communities they pollute. Powerful corporate interests have left the public with few options to fight back against this injustice.
In 2024 you can vote to change this.
🚨 New Investigation Exposes Animal Cruelty at the Denver Slaughterhouse
In Aug. 2024, undercover investigators captured horrific scenes: terrified lambs being kicked and violently thrown, lambs with prolapsed organs and broken legs forcibly dragged to their death, and lambs vocalizing and raising up their heads after being ‘slaughtered’. Learn more about what happens to animals inside ‘Superior Farms’.
Endorsements
Does your vision of a peaceful world include slaughterhouses?
Where individual efforts can feel futile, collective action can create real change.
While most of us agree on the harms of industrial animal farming, the industry has made it difficult to fight back through our own individual choices. The proposed measure to close the slaughterhouse in Denver recognizes that it’s the system that needs to change, as industries and politicians are failing to protect us. By coming together as voters, we can take one small step toward reshaping our approach to food production.
89% of Americans are concerned about industrial animal agriculture.
As our society’s morality and shared understanding constantly evolves, our concerns for animal welfare, the environment, and workers rights have deepened. The vast majority of Americans (89%) are concerned about industrial animal agriculture, citing animal welfare, worker safety, public health risks, and the environment.
Despite our attachment to meat, there’s also a growing unease about its impact. Recent polls indicate nearly half of Americans would support a ban on slaughterhouses, and over half of Denver voters say they would vote yes on the slaughterhouse ban ballot measure.
89% of Americans are concerned about industrial animal agriculture.
As our society’s morality and shared understanding constantly evolves, our concerns for animal welfare, the environment, and workers rights have deepened. The vast majority of Americans (89%) are concerned about industrial animal agriculture, citing animal welfare, worker safety, public health risks, and the environment.
Despite our attachment to meat, there’s also a growing unease about its impact. Recent polls indicate nearly half of Americans would support a ban on slaughterhouses, and over half of Denver voters say they would vote yes on the slaughterhouse ban ballot measure.
Where individual efforts can feel futile, collective action can create real change.
While most of us agree on the harms of industrial animal farming, the industry has made it difficult to fight back through our own individual choices. The proposed measure to close the slaughterhouse in Denver recognizes that it’s the system that needs to change, as industries and politicians are failing to protect us. By coming together as voters, we can take one small step toward reshaping our approach to food production.
Let’s make Denver next.
Why vote YES on 309 to ban slaughterhouses in Denver?
It’s no secret that animals suffer in slaughterhouses. With the horrors of modern factory farming and increasing availability of alternative options, many Americans feel deep misgivings about killing animals for food. Yet, we’ve felt powerless to create change just as individuals.
By acting together as citizens and voters, we can accelerate society’s transition to a more humane and just food system — one that protects humans, animals, and the environment.
Denver’s slaughterhouse contaminates air and water in the nation’s most polluted zip code.
In 2018, slaughterhouses dumped more than 55 million pounds of toxic substances directly into rivers and streams. This waste notoriously includes blood, fecal bacteria, and toxic chemicals. Denver’s slaughterhouse is located in the most polluted residential zip code in the country– 80216.
Located just 40 feet from the South Platte River, Superior Farms Denver has been in violation of the EPA’s Clean Water Act for over 4 years for failing to submit reports of its water discharge, with active violations identified over the past 3 quarters.
In September 2024, the EPA fined the Denver slaughterhouse $120,000 for violations of toxic chemical-related regulations. It was found they had failed to maintain proper safety standards in their use of anhydrous ammonia, which are a serious industrial health hazard. Even small leaks can be highly poisonous. Based on the EPA’s description, the local community has likely already been exposed. In large amounts, ammonia can contaminate water sources and pose an explosion risk.
“The Environmental Integrity Project’s new report, ‘Water Pollution from Slaughterhouses,’ finds that three quarters of large U.S. meat processing plants that discharge their wastewater directly into streams and rivers violated their pollution control permits over the last two years, with some dumping as much nitrogen pollution as small cities – and facing little or no enforcement.”
Superior Farms was sued by the federal government for animal welfare violations.
The reality of the slaughter industry is that “humane” regulations are frequently ignored, and animals suffer as they are killed. An analysis from the Animal Welfare Institute (AWI) found that animal welfare violations are not only frequent, but often repeated over and over by the same facilities with little consequence.
Superior Farms, the company that owns and operates Denver’s slaughterhouse, was sued by the Department of Justice for multiple violations of the Humane Slaughter Act as a result of an undercover slaughterhouse investigation. Many lambs were found still kicking or thrashing even after having their throats cut. In addition, while marketing some products as Halal, the footage also found “consistent and systematic violations of Halal law and principles.” Sadly, these types of violations are not unique to Superior Farms, but represent systemic cruelty within the industry.
“Every time our investigators go inside animal agribusiness operations, we uncover horrific abuses. Sadly, farmed animals are routinely treated like unfeeling meat-, milk- and egg-producing machines and are forced to endure tremendous suffering. As long as facilities like Superior Farms are driven by profit, animals will continue to pay the price.”
Slaughterhouse workers face significant rates of serious mental health conditions.
There are significantly higher rates of depression, addiction, anxiety, and PTSD in slaughterhouse workers when compared with similar industries. Some research also connects slaughterhouse work to increased crime rates – including violent crimes and sex offenses – in surrounding areas due to the unique psychological stress of these jobs.
Superior Farms’ Denver slaughterhouse is no exception. Muslim employees actually sued the facility in 2021 after non-English speaking ‘halal bleeders’ endured racial harassment, denial of religious accommodations, and coercion to sign documents they couldn’t understand. There have been several severe injuries at the slaughterhouse, including a thumb amputation and a debilitating ankle injury that left one worker with chronic pain. The facility has accumulated over 600 USDA violations since 2019, received EPA fines for chemical safety violations, and exposed workers to hazardous conditions including ammonia leaks and flooding. Despite the dangerous working conditions, workers earn just above minimum wage.
Many of us don’t want to think about where our meat comes from, but slaughterhouse workers face psychological trauma every day when they clock in. No one should have to kill animals all day to pay the bills.
“At the time I managed to dissociate from what I was doing by focusing on the physical aspects of the job. In the longer term, it led to severe depression, suicide attempts, and self-sabotaging of relationships. It was my frame of mind from doing those jobs that put me in that place.”
– Doug Maw, Former Slaughterhouse Worker
Virologists call intensive animal farming the most risky human behavior for pandemics.
Three-quarters of emerging infectious diseases are transmitted from animals to humans, making intensive animal farming ripe for breeding and spreading disease. Since 1940, at least half of new zoonotic diseases have been associated with animal agriculture, including the current bird flu. The disease’s first human case was reported here in Colorado earlier this summer in a dairy farmer, with 10 Coloradans so far having contracted the virus – 9 cases at two poultry farms and one case from a dairy farm – the most in any state.
As viruses jump to new species, the risk of spreading to humans increases. A UN official endorsed a report that called animal farming “the single most risky human behavior for pandemics”, with many experts warning that our current food system is a ticking time bomb for the next major public health crisis. It’s time to make changes to protect ourselves as well as the many species we share this planet with.
“The world sleepwalked into coronavirus. This has cost us so much both in terms of the loss of life and also the impact on jobs and the economy. Governments must wake up and realize the risks they are taking with our lives..”
– William Gildea, postdoctoral research fellow at the Centre for Research in Ethics
Animal agriculture drains more than 50% of the water from the Colorado river.
Increasingly dry, hot weather has led to more devastating wildfire seasons and droughts here in Colorado. The Colorado River, a source of water for 7 states, is drying up in part due to climate change – to which industrial animal farming is a major contributing factor – and in part due to chronic overuse of water resources.
Over 50% of the water in the Colorado River basin goes to irrigate crops not for human consumption, but for animal feed. In the U.S., two-thirds of crop calories are fed not to humans, but to farmed animals. As rising temperatures and unchecked usage affect our most precious resource, farmers and consumers alike are already feeling the destructive environmental impact. It’s time to reckon with the root causes of these issues to ensure a habitable planet for growing food and sustaining future generations.
“The production of fur imposes significant adverse impacts on both
– W. Ian Lipkin, Epidemiologist
the environment and human health. Far from being a natural resource,
fur production is an intensely toxic and energy-consumptive process.”
The meat industry has taken away the choice to ‘vote with our dollar’.
While every other type of business has to play by the rules of the free market, the meat industry gets funding from our tax dollars to subsidize their production costs, compensate them for losses, help them out when market conditions are poor, and subsidize their products when they’re being sold back to us as consumers – in addition to government-funded advertising campaigns, which have been effective at increasing Americans’ meat consumption over decades.
Whether or not we purchase their products, they still get our money – shielding them from the responsibility that other businesses have to pivot and innovate based on evolving consumer values. This measure allows us to fight back against corporate interests and corruption.
“Under that program [which paid lamb producers $50M to offset low prices and poor market conditions], Superior Farms received $361,278 of our tax dollars…If the industry is the economic powerhouse they claim to be for Colorado, why are they dependent on these corporate welfare programs?”
– Crystal Heath, Veterinarian, Executive Director of Our Honor Vets
A Blight on Denver’s Most Polluted Neighborhood
Industrial slaughterhouses like Superior Farms’ facility in Denver prioritize efficiency and profits over animal welfare and environmental stewardship. Denver’s slaughterhouse is located in Globeville, where its gross negligence contributes to the environmental injustice faced by a community living in the most polluted residential zip code in the country– 80216.
This slaughterhouse contaminates the Platte River with feces, was recently fined $119K by the EPA for multiple violations of the Clean Air Act, and emits a stench so foul that neighbors for several blocks around are forced to keep their windows shut year-round.
Globeville is a primarily Hispanic neighborhood with a poverty level almost double the average in Denver. This is no accident – industrial slaughterhouses and factory farms are disproportionately in lower-income neighborhoods and communities of color. It’s time for us to take action as voters to help clean up our community.
Slaughterhouses by the numbers
92
BILLION
land animals are killed annually in the global food system, according to recent data from the Food and Agriculture Organization.
91%
OF AMERICANS
agreed with the statement “Farmed animals have roughly the same ability to feel pain and discomfort as humans” in a 2020 poll.
What would the slaughterhouse ban in Denver impact?
Initiated Ordinance 309 will appear on the city’s ballot in November 2024. If passed, the measure would prohibit the operation of slaughterhouses and opening of new slaughter facilities in the city and county of Denver, with some exceptions as listed below. Ordinance 309 would go into effect in January of 2026. Given that lambs are slaughtered around 6 months old, this should give farmers enough time to adjust the number of lambs they breed to match the available slaughtering capacity.
Programs like Transfarmation Project and Rancher Advocacy Program can help farmers explore alternative sources of income and transition their operations.
The measure would include:
- The closure of an industrial scale slaughterhouse in Denver, which kills half a million lambs per year. This is the only slaughterhouse located within city limits.
- The opening of new slaughterhouses, or facilities where “livestock” animals are killed for food to sell to consumers.
- The prioritization of affected workers in Denver’s employment assistance programs.
The measure would NOT include:
- Restrictions on the backyard slaughter of animals, or non-commercial slaughter.
- Regulations on the killing of animals for research purposes. The ordinance would only impact animals killed for food.
- Any regulations on the sale of meat in the city.
A Just Transition for Denver Slaughterhouse Workers
Currently, 160 employees work at the Superior Farms slaughterhouse in Denver for low wages (starting around $19.30/hour, only $1 above minimum wage). Slaughterhouse jobs are incredibly punishing – physically and mentally – for low wages, and slaughterhouses generally see between 80-100% worker turnover every year. Based on this, it’s safe to say that if Denver Initiated Ordinance 309 passes, most current employees at the facility will have moved on by the time the plant would to close in January 2026. That means that any employees working at Superior Farms in Denver will have 14 months to find new employment.
Better Opportunities and a Brighter Future for Denver Workers
The Denver slaughterhouse ban specifically includes a provision mandating that the city prioritize slaughterhouse workers affected by job loss in its workforce training and employment assistance program, paid for by Denver’s Climate Protection Fund. While participating in this program, former slaughterhouse workers will have access to paid apprenticeships and training to start careers in the renewable energy, sustainable construction, urban forestry, and electric vehicle sectors. Denver’s Green Jobs program is specifically designed to help immigrants and underserved communities transition to safer, healthier green careers with more long-term security.
Denver Slaughterhouse Workers Can Help Fill the Current Gaps in Colorado’s Economy.
Fortunately, there are plenty of opportunities for workers, even for those that do not speak English, that are far less physically and mentally harmful than working in a slaughterhouse. The US Chamber of Commerce has classified Colorado’s labor shortage as “severe”, with 52 available workers for every 100 open jobs. Colorado’s talent dashboard shows an abundance of jobs of all skill levels in Denver metro & surrounding areas, creating ideal conditions for former slaughterhouse workers to transition into more sustainable, higher-paying careers that benefit both their wellbeing and the local economy.
“You come home and you’re fucked up, whether from drugs or just from killing animals all day, slitting their throats, spilling their guts, hearing them scream… It disrupts your family dynamic, how you’re supposed to relate to your wife and kids.”
– Jose Huizar, Lifelong Globeville resident and former Superior Farms employee
Economic Benefits of Closing the Denver Slaughterhouse
Ordinance 309 is expected to create positive economic impacts for both the city and local residents by closing a polluting facility along the South Platte river, leading to improved property values, public health, water quality, and recreational opportunities in the area. Despite opposition claims, the Denver slaughterhouse ban is unlikely to affect food prices. Superior Farms, Denver’s only slaughterhouse, processes only lamb, and with 23 other USDA-licensed lamb slaughter facilities in Colorado, the supply will remain unaffected.
Denver Slaughterhouse Ban (Initiated Ordinance 309) FAQs
The Denver fur ban (Initiated Ordinance 308) would not apply to wool, leather, sheepskin, shearling, goat fur, cowhide, taxidermy, or any fur product from an animal defined as “livestock” under the Colorado Revised Statutes. This policy is designed to target products from animals killed primarily for their fur, including foxes, raccoons, rabbits, chinchillas, minks, and others. Measure 308 would apply to any products made from new fur, including clothes, accessories, and furniture.
Initiative 308 would not impact the wearing of fur, or the purchase of second hand fur products. Selling pre-owned fur, buying thrifted fur, or recycling old fur products to make a new product would still be allowed under the new law. See the full fur ban legislation text here.
Echoing fur-free laws that have passed in other cities, Denver Measure 308 focuses on leaving fur behind as an achievable step towards protecting animals from being killed or abused for clothing.
Despite environmental concerns around faux furs made from plastics, real fur ranks as having a much worse overall impact. A life cycle analysis compared mink fur production with cotton, acrylic, and polyester. It found that the other textiles scored better in 17 out of 18 environmental measures, with mink fur having an environmental impact 5x greater than the next highest scoring textile. Fur farms are extremely resource inefficient and have a shockingly high carbon footprint, mainly due to the amount of feed and water required to sustain the animals and the harmful pollutants released into our atmosphere.
With so many natural, plant-based fibers available, many people agree that fur of any kind feels unnecessary. But for those craving the fashion aesthetic of fur, some designers are using faux fur made from all-natural materials like cotton, straw, and hemp, bio-based polymer fibers, or upcycled materials like recycled fabrics, denim, and plastic bottles. Sustainable faux furs like the ones highlighted in Eluxe Magazine are the most eco-friendly options for those seeking the “fur” look and feel. While these products are relatively upscale, clothes made from animal fur are an expensive luxury item to begin with.
There are at least six local businesses that sell a significant amount of fur products here in Denver: Overland Sheepskin, A Tsagas Furs and Leathers, Jonval Leathers and Furs, Louis Vuitton, Neimen Marcus, and Dan Sharp Luxury Outerwear.
We encourage these businesses to go fur-free and transition instead to selling any of the numerous alternative products that can meet demand for winter clothing. If Denver Initiated Ordinance 308 is signed into law after the 2024 election, Denver’s fur stores would have until July 2025 to phase out fur from their stores.
With so many cruelty-free alternatives, these stores would have no shortage of options with which to replace their fur products, and plenty of time to smoothly make this transition.
This policy exempts fur products purchased for traditional tribal, cultural, or spiritual purposes by a member of a federally recognized or state-recognized Native American tribe. Tribal members can continue to sell and trade fur products, including the selling of wares at the annual Denver Powwow. Proposed Ordinance 308 borrowed the native exception language from the state of California’s fur ban, signed into law by California’s governor as Assembly Bill 44.
We hope this exemption avoids any unfair restrictions or oppression against Indigenous Americans and their cultural and spiritual practices. Native Americans, like the broader population, hold diverse opinions about the use of animals for clothing and food. There are many who want to move away from harming animals while simultaneously protecting tribal sovereignty and culture, such as the authors recently featured in Sentient Media’s Indigenous Voices for Saving Animals and Earth. We welcome further information on this topic, particularly if you are Indigenous and have thoughts on the fur or slaughterhouse ban. Feel free to contact us.
A report by ProVeg makes the case that intensive animal farming is the “single most risky human behaviour” for pandemics. That’s because 75% of emerging human diseases come from our handling of animals, both wild and domesticated. Musonda Mumba of the UN Environment Programme endorsed the report, saying it “clearly demonstrates the connection between industrial animal production and the increased risk of pandemics. Never before have so many opportunities existed for pathogens to jump from wild and domestic animals to people.”
In 2020 the CDC reported that COVID-19 had infected 11 U.S. mink farms. The issue was even more serious in northern Europe, where Denmark culled all minks living on fur farms, killing a staggering 17 million animals. COVID broke out on Dutch mink farms as well and prompted the Netherlands—whose citizens had already voted to ban mink farming by 2024— to close the industry early in 2021 instead.
If you feel disgust about the idea of farming animals only to mass-kill them when disease spreads, listen to that feeling. We should be offended by the amount of suffering involved. Let’s seek to leave fur and slaughterhouses behind and vote YES on Denver Initiated Ordinance 308 and 309 both for our human health and security, and for the animals’.
It is well-documented that keeping wide-ranging animals in small cages causes severe distress, with numerous fur farm investigations demonstrating the extreme toll on the animals held captive. Humane Society International’s most recent investigation of five fur farms in China, the source of the majority of the world’s fur, found “…foxes, raccoon dogs and mink pacing their cages frantically, a repetitive behavior associated with mental decline, and filthy, feces-encrusted cages packed so close together that the risk of zoonotic disease spread was nearly palpable.” Norway, once the world’s largest producer of fox fur, decided to end fur farming in 2018 following shocking evidence of welfare violations on fox and mink fur farms.
The US federal government does not regulate the treatment of animals on fur farms, and even the Humane Slaughter Act excludes animals raised for fur, who are typically killed through painful methods like electrocution, gassing, or suffocation. Industry guidelines around animal welfare are voluntary and not legally enforced. To better understand the horrific treatment of animals that is standard for fur farms, we can look at examples of the enforcement of welfare regulations in other countries. In 2017, a German law required that minks get bigger cages with swimming basins to satisfy their semi-aquatic nature. By 2019, all German mink farms closed.
Regulations requiring larger cage sizes, enrichment, and proper care in Sweden and Switzerland also resulted in the collapse of their fur industries. In these cases, even the most basic of regulations, such as bigger cages, resulted in the industries being deemed “unprofitable”. By design, fur industry profits rely on the raising, keeping and slaughtering of animals in the most inexpensive ways possible – resulting in the mass suffering of the animals living on fur farms.
Pro-Animal Future (PAF) is made up of dozens of dedicated campaigners who volunteer their time to making the world a better place for animals. Check out our About Us page to get to know the dedicated volunteers who make this organization possible!
Pro-Animal Future is a 501(c)(4) political organization that was incubated by Pax Fauna, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit focused on research. Pax Fauna is known for its studies on public attitudes regarding the use of animals for food, and narratives that can increase support for pro-animal initiatives. These findings play a central role in PAF’s strategy. Currently, five full-time Pax Fauna employees support the Yes on 308 campaign to ban fur sales in Denver.
Seeded with funding from the Phauna Foundation as well as numerous small donations, Pro-Animal Future has built a movement powered by small donors and incredibly dedicated volunteers. We warmly invite you to join us as a donor, petitioner, canvasser, or engaged citizen to advance animal freedom, one ballot measure at a time.