Massachusetts legislators avoided a spiking prices on eggs and pork products at the start of the new year by defying the will of voters for the second time in as many ballot initiatives during the 2016 election.
Massachusetts voters approved ballot Question Three, Minimum Size Requirements for Farm Animal Containment, on Election Day, November 8, 2016, by a margin of 2,530,143 (77.64%) to 728,654 (22.36%). Voters affirmed the question which prohibits “breeding pigs, calves raised for veal, and egg-laying hens from being held in spaces which prevent an animal from lying down, standing up, fully extending its limbs, or turning around freely.” The initiative set an implementation date of January 1, 2022.
Despite five years to implement the mandate of the voters, the legislature passed a bill on Monday.
Without legislative action, the language in the ballot initiative would become law. It required that hen laying eggs have no less than 1.5 feet of floor space in cages. Some animal rights groups and industry representatives say that since the law passed, the industry standard cages are one foot wide with more vertical floor space. With legislative action, most eggs would be illegal to sell on January 1.
The issue that prevented passing a bill had nothing to do with eggs.
The Massachusetts House of Representatives passed a bill which delayed the implementation of regulations in the initiative for humane treatment of pigs until 2023. The Senate version complied with the will of the voters in the 2016 initiative.
A conference committee, which includes members from both houses to work out the differences in the bills, convened in October. It announced a compromise on Monday to delay the regulations on pigs for seven and one-half months.
A unified version of the bill passed both houses on Monday, sending it to the Governor’s desk for signing into law.
Ballot question four in 2016, the Massachusetts Marijuana Legalization Initiative, approved by 53.66% of voters, set a date of January 1, 2018 for implementation. The legislature also delayed implementation of the will of the voters on that initiative by six months until July. In practice, the first store for recreational use marijuana was not allowed to open until November.
