Carrol Abel, director of Hidden Valley Wild Horse Protection Fund and National Equine Policy Examiner, has uncovered minutes of meetings of the Nevada Board of Agriculture that reveal discussions about how to build support for a facility to slaughter horses, particularly the Virginia Range horses or other horses deemed “feral” or “estray” and owned by the state.
The minutes reveal Board members discussed trying to create a U.S. market for horsemeat. The minutes of a Dec. 6, 2011 meeting indicate Dr. Boyd Spratling, co-chair of the U.S. Bureau of Land Management Advisory Board, and a veterinarian, said, “Think looking at putting facilities on Indian reservations, which takes Legislature and everybody out of the equation.” As Board member Dean Baker put it, “We would not get hammered the same way [as the Legislature would]”.