The San Antonio City Council will vote on a timeline to phase out the Horse-Drawn Carriage (HDC) industry early next month. But council members have a wide range of opinions on exactly how long it should take for the industry to leave San Antonio.
City staff presented three phase-out options to the city council on Thursday, including a 12-month plan, a 24-month plan, and a 36-month plan.
District 8 Councilmember Manny Pelaez, a 2025 mayoral candidate, led off council discussion on the plans with the view that the issue had already dragged on for far too long.
“I'm for prohibiting these horse carriages from operating downtown yesterday,” he said. “And to me, one year seems too much.”
The Council Consideration Request (CCR) that led to the phase-out vote council will take next month was written in 2022. It was drafted in response to complaints of HDCs slowing down already-congested downtown streets and concerns over the horses’ health.
A similar number of council members each supported phase-out periods of one year or less, three years, and five years. Only one council member — District 9’s John Courage — was completely against a ban. District 2 Councilmember Jalen McKee-Rodriguez said he would be fine with any of the city’s three proposals.
The details of the city staff’s proposed plans varied, but broadly, the longer plans give business owners and carriage operators a longer runway to figure out what they’re going to do once horse-drawn carriages are banned.
Each plan would attempt to put carriage operators in contact with the city’s job training initiative Ready to Work and other job fairs and make businessowners familiar with the city’s zero interest loan program to handle debt.
According to the city’s presentation of self-reported debt, the five existing HDC companies range in debt from $67,000 to $700,000.
District 3 Councilmember Phyllis Viagran, a co-author of the original CCR, said the HDC companies need to be given a long runway to avoid financial collapse.
“What I know — because I was a small businessowner that had to wind down her business — is that if it happens in one to two years, you can basically guarantee there will be a bankruptcy proceeding,” she said. “And the city should not be in the business of closing down small businesses.”
Viagran proposed a five-year phase-out plan so that businessowners had more time to consolidate and bring down their debt. District 10 Councilmember Marc Whyte and District 5 Councilmember Teri Castillo agreed with that timeline.
Pelaez said HDC companies should have been working on that in the last two years since the policy was proposed, and said the longer the industry operates in San Antonio, the higher the risk of a high-profile incident that could impact the city’s tourism.
“Whenever a horse drops dead ... or collapses on the street, the tourists in those cities take out their phones and they start posting those videos to social media, and it's just a matter of two days — those videos get millions of hits,” he said.
There have been no incidences of horses dying or collapsing in San Antonio, but Pelaez said the risk is real because of deaths and collapses elsewhere.
Another major concern for council members was the loss of high-paying jobs for carriage operators.
Whyte read a letter from one of the operators about the job’s impact on her life as a single mother.
“‘This job supports my entire family and my pets. It allows me flexibility in my life and income will be hard to replace with other jobs. I’m the only provider for my family. $95,000-$100,000 a year,’” he said, reading the letter. “In contrast, when we look at the Ready to Work program that we have in place right now, the mean annual salary for a new job is $44,009.”
A survey the city conducted with HDC operators found that 11 of 44 respondents made more than $90,000. A clear majority of 31 made more than $50,000.
The same survey found that almost half were not interested in the Ready to Work program and three quarters were not interested in driving electric carriages, a potential alternative for HDC companies the city has explored. HDC owners were also hesitant about electric carriages, according to the survey, because of their high cost, lack of public interest in riding them, and less justification for the level of fares they currently charge for HDCs.
Castillo said any one of her colleagues that pushed to shut the industry down quickly was interested in killing jobs.
“I believe anything less than five years is a disservice and will create further distrust with San Antonio and Texan residents, because ultimately, what we're talking about here is killing jobs and an industry in a time where we know there's already economic insecurity,” she said.
Castillo said she was also concerned that if companies do fall into bankruptcy, horses could be seized in asset forfeiture and end up in dangerous situations.
Horse health was one of the major reasons several council members advocated for a speedy drawdown of the industry. Council members pointed to car exhaust and heat as key dangers.
District 6 Councilmember Melissa Cabello Havrda said that was one of her primary reasons for supporting a one-year plan.
“I do think they're very well taken care of,” she said about the horses’ stable conditions. “I fed them an apple or two, but that's not the issue. That was never the issue. It's when they're on the streets of San Antonio.”
The city-contracted veterinarian who assesses HDC horses has previously said the horses are perfectly healthy, but the city has been unable to get any veterinarian from surrounding counties to independently assess the horses. Council members asked for a second opinion given the city-contracted veterinarian’s personal financial interest in the industry’s longevity. But no specific evidence has been provided suggesting San Antonio HDC horses were in danger.
District 4 Councilmember Adriana Rocha Garcia said she supported a three-year plan because it seemed to be the compromise position from her colleagues supporting one- or five-year plans.
City Manager Erik Walsh said staff would bring a phase-out option up for a council vote in early December. It was not clear what timeline city staff will propose for the council to vote on.
