Beverly Hills Rejects Initiative to Require Cruelty Tags on Furs

In a small municipal election designed to send a big message, Beverly Hills voters decided Tuesday that the city’s fancy furriers need not put tags on garments informing customers how the animals that provided the pelts died.

With all the ballots tallied late Tuesday night, there were 3,363 votes opposing Proposition A and 1,908 in favor of it.

“This is a great victory,” said Rudy Cole, campaign manager for the No on A campaign. “The fact that the city rejected this measure shows that Beverly Hills is not the place to try goofy ideas.”

The losers tried to look at the bright side of their defeat.

“We started out trying to get the message out in a local Beverly Hills election, and ended up attracting worldwide attention to the issue of animal cruelty,” said Luke Montgomery, campaign manager for the Yes on A Committee.

Proposition A had drawn a strong response in Beverly Hills, with lawn signs, full-page advertisements in area newspapers and volunteers going door to door promoting or denouncing the measure.

Proponents and foes of the measure amassed $150,000 in contributions--much of it donated by animal rights sympathizers and fur industry representatives with interests far beyond Beverly Hills and its dozen fur stores.

Some saw Proposition A as a chance to set an example.

William Goldstein, a 66-year-old writer, said the city should take the lead on issues that promote consumer choice and animal protection.

“I voted for the measure,” Goldstein said. “I’m an environmentalist and I’ve seen what happens in laboratories to animals . . . the cruel things that happen by people who should know better.”

Real estate agent Mickee Heumann disagreed.

“I’m not for cruelty to animals, but they are using Beverly Hills’ name to draw attention to their issue and that is not good,” Heumann said.

Dr. Mark Vogel, another resident, saw the initiative as a waste.

“There is too much money being spent on something that won’t amount to anything,” said Vogel, who cast a no vote. “Furs don’t come from Beverly Hills.”

Proposition A would have required that any garment with fur valued at more than $50 be tagged with a special label unless the store owner could show proof that the animal died under humane conditions.

The tags, the size of a credit card, would have read: “Consumer notice: This product is made with fur from animals that may have been killed by electrocution, gassing, neck breaking, poisoning, clubbing, stomping or drowning and may have been trapped in steel-jaw, leg-hold traps.”

Fur industry representatives acknowledged that some animals are killed under painful conditions, but they contend that U.S. furriers adhere to strict veterinary guidelines that minimize pain. Furriers also complained that the numerous methods listed on the tags would have made it impossible for any fur store to get an exemption.

The group Beverly Hills Consumers for Informed Choices gathered 3,000 signatures to force the City Council in February to put Proposition A on the ballot. The self-styled consumer protection group was criticized by its opponents as an extremist animal rights organization.

Supporters mailed graphic videotapes depicting animal slaughter to 5,000 of the city’s 20,000 registered voters. In mailings, celebrities Jack Lemmon, Sid Caesar and Buddy Hackett, all Beverly Hills residents, lent their names to the initiative.

The No on A committee distributed literature accusing measure supporters of using “scare tactics” and “exaggerated and frightening messages” to get their point across. They compiled a list of opponents of the measure, including current and past Beverly Hills City Council members and other community leaders.

Douglas Fine, manager of Somper Furs, said his store contacted more than 2,000 Beverly Hills customers and urged them to vote.

Proponents of the measure acknowledged that they were in a tough fight against opponents who contended that the city is being picked on. But Wayne Pacella, vice president of the Humane Society of the United States, had said Beverly Hills was well suited for the initiative.

“Beverly Hills is an attractive site for this sort of measure because its climate makes it abundantly clear that fur is not necessary,” he said.