On Wednesday August 19, 2015, four people were injured in the second incident involving horse-drawn carriages in St. Louis in just two weeks. On Friday, August 7, 2015, a carriage driver sustained major injuries when her carriage was struck by a van while operating during rush hour, in direct violation of the vehicle for hire code. Our sympathies and best wishes go out to all of the victims for a full and quick recovery. Still, the simple fact remains that accidents such as these were entirely foreseeable and preventable if the Metropolitan Taxicab Commission (“MTC”) had not abandoned its statutory obligation to regulate the horse-drawn carriage industry.

The MTC was created by the Missouri Legislature to govern all taxicab services within the district, which includes St. Louis City and St. Louis County. In the law, a taxicab is defined as: “any motor vehicle or nonmotorized carriage engaged in the business of carrying persons for hire on the streets of the district.” § 67.1800(14) RSMo. Yet, around the end of 2013, the MTC inexplicably, and without public notice, simply stopped regulating the horse-carriage industry.

Since then, the carriages have been operating unregulated, and at times without licenses, in downtown St. Louis and in St. Louis County’s Tilles Park. They have been seen routinely violating the rules on almost any given day. Restrictions on operating during rush hour, near the stadium before, during, and after Cardinals games and other public events, working the horses during extreme heat, etc. are not being enforced. And, during this time, there has been one incident after another.

• December 2013, King, a 22-year-old Clydesdale owned by Brookdale Farms died while pulling a carriage full of passengers through the Winter Wonderland display in Tilles Park. [http://fox2now.com/2013/12/23/tilles-park-horse-dies-while-pulling-carriage/]

• July 2014, Moose, another Brookdale Farms horse, was observed in heat distress after pulling a carriage downtown while the heat index was over 100 degrees.

• July 2014, an inspection by the St. Louis City Public Health Director found Brookdale Farms’ stable to be in poor condition. [http://stlouis.cbslocal.com/2014/07/15/health-director-issues-report-on-horse-carriage-companies/]

• September 2014, part of a young woman's finger was bitten off by a St. Louis Carriage Company horse. [http://www.riverfronttimes.com/newsblog/2014/09/09/downtown-carriage-horse-bites-tip-off-tourists-finger]

• April 2015, a St. Louis Carriage Company horse was allowed to escape from his driver and was caught on video galloping uncontrolled at full speed down Market Street. The company admitted the driver did not follow policy, and that someone could have been killed. According to the witness who provided the video, this was the third such incident this year. [http://www.ksdk.com/story/news/local/2015/04/27/runaway-carriage-horse/26455185/]

• And now these two back-to-back accidents in August 2015.

Even before MTC abandoned its responsibilities to the public, it was aware of issues with the horse-carriage industry. In May 2010, reports from the public that “horses being used by Brookdale Farms were being neglected” prompted MTC to send a veterinarian to their stable in Eureka. The investigating veterinarian reported to the MTC that all of the Brookdale Farms horses he examined were suffering from “inadequate caloric intake.” [http://www.stl-taxi.com/documents/10-0512MeetingMinutesApproved.pdf] Still, even with knowledge of such problems, MTC chose to stop regulating the carriage-horse companies.

Despite contradictory statements to the media as to whether or not MTC is responsible for regulating the carriage-horse industry, a lawsuit filed by the St. Louis Animal Rights Team, along with the serious accident on August 7, caused the commission to finally state publicly that indeed it is. However, now that MTC has been caught not fulfilling its duties to the public and fears it may have to start enforcing its rules, its solution appears to be to start doing away with the rules. Obviously, in light of everything that has happened and the ongoing problems in the horse-drawn carriage industry, less regulation and less enforcement would be disastrous.

Please reject any effort to relax or eliminate ANY of the already minimal rules that are in place. If MTC lacks the resources or motivation to adequately regulate the horse-carriages to protect the safety of the people and the horses, the carriages should not be on our streets at all.