School districts pull beef after federal ban

By: CATHY REDFERN - Staff Writer
Chino slaughterhouse under investigation for treatment of ill cows | Friday, February 1, 2008 10:16 PM PST ∞

All four local school districts took beef off their lunch menus this week after the U.S. Department of Agriculture announced a ban on meat from a Chino slaughterhouse that supplies school programs nationwide.

The move was prompted by a video released Wednesday by the Humane Society of the United States. The society says the video shows workers at Hallmark Meat Packing Co. kicking, shocking, jabbing and ramming cows with fork-lift blades in attempts to move those too ill to walk into a slaughterhouse.

The society claims those actions are not only cruel, but that meat from "downed cows" carries an increased risk of disease. Hallmark supplies Westland Meat Co., which processes the carcasses and supplies meat for school and other government programs.

In a statement, Agriculture Secretary Ed Schafer said he was deeply concerned about the allegations. However, Schafer said he was not aware of any immediate health risk.

The president of Hallmark and Westland meat companies, Steve Mendell, issued a statement saying he was "sickened" by the video and had fired two workers shown in it.

Nancy Craig, the director of food services for Temecula Valley Unified School District, said the state Department of Education notified school districts of the federal ban Thursday. Most beef was off students' plates by Thursday, and all of it was gone by Friday, she added.

The district gets its beef from Don Lee Farms of Los Angeles County, which processes it into hamburgers and other items and cooks it, Craig said. That company is one of several that were identified by the California Department of Education as possible recipients of Westland meat.

"We've stopped serving commodity beef at all our schools until we find out if in fact (we received any meat from Hallmark)," Craig said. "Our distributor is tracking it to see if that is one of their suppliers."

Hamburgers are served at Temecula's middle and high schools once or twice per week, Craig said, and elementary schools have beef on their menus about three times per month.

Karissa Warren, 18, a senior at Chaparral High School in Temecula, said she noticed there weren't any hamburgers or combination burritos served Friday at lunch. But it didn't affect her, she said, as she likes cows and pigs and doesn't eat beef or pork.

"No one buys the hamburgers anyway," she said. "They're gross."

When told about the video, she said the cruelty of the workers' actions shown was hard to believe.

"That is so mean," she said. "How can they do that?"

Matthew Agajanian, 15, said he assumed the school had just run out of beef, and that he was unaware of the ban. He said they usually run out of chicken burritos, not beef, but that he likes the combination burritos.

"It sucks," he said. "Those burritos were good."

Menifee Union School District's food services director, David Warren, said the district also uses meat processed by Don Lee Farms. The only menu item it affects in the K-8 district is mini-cheeseburgers, which will be replaced with turkey corn dogs until they hear more from the state Department of Education, he said.

The ban is not a safety or health concern, but a precautionary measure, he said.

In a statement issued Wednesday, Schafer, the federal agriculture secretary, said he wished the Humane Society had advised them sooner, as the video was filmed last fall. He said all products from Westland Meat Co. would not be permitted in federal food and nutrition programs pending an investigation.

Federal and state law generally prohibits mistreatment of disabled animals, and federal regulations prohibit the use of downed cows in food as they may pose an increased risk of disease.

A spokeswoman for the Murrieta Valley Unified School District said they too pulled beef from their meals after getting notice Thursday from the state. Four menu items were suspended, Karen Parris said: mini-cheeseburgers, teriyaki beef dunkers, hamburgers and rib-b-que sandwiches.

She said the state asked them not to throw the beef out, in case investigators needed to test it, and that they are storing it in a freezer separate from other food.

At schools in the Lake Elsinore Unified School District, the beef tacos on Friday's menu were quickly replaced with other items, said district spokesman Jose Carvajal. Monday's hamburgers will be replaced, too, he said.

The district plans to notify parents of the ban, Carvajal said.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Contact staff writer Cathy Redfern at (951) 676-4315, Ext. 2621, or credfern@californian.com.

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