A new state bill out of Sacramento, California, looks to prevent market livestock that win at county fairs from automatically being sent for processing after junior livestock sales.
Assembly Bill 3053, introduced last week by Assembly member Ash Kalra, would amend Section 4501 of California’s Food and Agricultural Code. The law, if passed, will require that junior exhibit entries be received only with the approval of a parent or guardian and that livestock buyers can elect for live animal pickup, even if the sale is considered terminal.
More pointedly, the bill also requires that parents or guardians can authorize those entries to be withdrawn before offsite animal transport.
The bill follows the story of a 9-year-old Shasta County girl, who entered her market goat into a terminal livestock sale at the Shasta District Fair in June of 2022. After selling that goat to a buyer, the young girl decided she was not OK with her goat, Cedar, being sent for slaughter.
According to news releases, after the sale, this girl and her mother, Jessica Long, removed the goat from the fairgrounds in a desperate bid to save Cedar from processing. The problem was that they removed the goat without permission from the goat’s new owner, State Sen. Brian Dahle, or the hosting fair board, resulting in a wild goat chase.
In an email to the Shasta District Fair on June 27, Long wrote: “I knew when I took it that my next steps were to make it right with the buyer and the fairgrounds. I will pay you back for the goat and any other expenses I caused. I would like to ask for your support in finding a solution.”
Although Dahle, was reportedly amiable to making other arrangements for the market goat, local law enforcement at the Shasta Sheriff’s Office secured a search warrant and ultimately seized the goat from a farm that Long had left the goat at in hopes of saving the animal from slaughter.
In the end, Cedar was processed as a market animal for consumption in July 2022.
The story has resulted in an emotional response from parents, exhibitors, animal-rights activists, and the public.
Following the goat’s seizure and subsequent slaughter, the Longs sued the fair in federal court in April 2023, citing violations of the Fourth and Fifteenth Amendments and a waste of police resources.
Attorney General Bob Bonta, acting as an attorney for the fair, responded by filing a counterclaim against the Longs in November 2023, seeking damages on behalf of the Shasta District Fair.
The Longs’ attorney, Vanessa Shakib of Advancing Law for Animals, a nonprofit animal-rights activist law firm, filed a motion to strike down Bonta’s counterclaim.
Shakib has praised the bill, saying, “We applaud proposed legislation allowing successful bidders to take their animals home alive. The government shouldn’t force people to kill their animals. This commonsense language is an important step in protecting property rights.”
»Related: Perspective: It’s important to understand that market livestock’s ‘end game’ is the dinner table