Romford former head of PR, Kim Sanzone, is part of an international ‘pro racing’ group who are lobbying to save greyhound racing in its most prolific state – Florida. In the following piece, she explains what is at stake and what can be done about it:
The future of greyhound racing in Florida is under threat. Prop 67 is an amendment to the Florida State Constitution currently being sought by anti-racing lobbying group Grey2k and likely to be added to the ballots in November, if it succeeds then ALL Florida tracks will lose their racing licences leaving 8,000 greys requiring homes and at least 3,000 jobs lost. What makes this scenario even worse is the latest suggestion to pair up the proposal with 2 others – banning vaping in public spaces and banning offshore drilling. Both the latter proposals have seen high numbers voting to ban on polls so makes this even harder for the greyhound folk of Florida to win.
Whilst the polls are dubious to say the least it can all sway public opinion and could give the green light to push this forward. The original poll – paid for and conducted by anti-racing lobbyist group Grey2k – resulted in 1,000 voting with the result going against racing but unfortunately pro racers were not invited to vote making the result rather shady and totally inaccurate. Two further polls – openly available on Florida newspaper websites – showed completely different results with one demonstrating 77% in favour of retaining racing and the other showing 80% voting either NO to the ban or to allow legislature to decide – which would suggest Grey2k’s original results were not truly representative of public opinion. What makes this even more laughable is that one commenter stated that dogs were crated and locked up for “20-30 hours a day” – now unless I’ve totally not got the hang of a normal day this surely demonstrates the mentality of the people involved in this process?
One of the main issues surrounding this is the lack of funds that the pro racing greyhound people have to take any legal action – let’s not forget that Grey2k have a high number of ‘donators’ to aid their side – but what the pro racing community does have is tenacity and a fighting spirit and with that in mind they are doing all they can to fight this proposal.
At a recent meeting of the CRC (Constitution Revision Commission) – or those with the power to enforce this ban to put it in layman’s terms – they voted 18 in favour of the ban, 14 against and 5 none voters – it requires 22 in favour to get it on the November ballot.
Please Vote NO to Prop 67 and save Greyhound Racing. Link here and here
*If you would like to learn more about this or track our progress please let us know.
