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Aug 8, 2007 7:28 pm US/Eastern
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Stable Used By Arabbers Closed Down
by Mike Schuh
BALTIMORE (WJZ) ―
City officials have closed down one of three stables in the city that house horses used by arabbers. Those are the men who sell fruit on the back of horse-drawn carts in the city. They were asked to vacate the building by the end of Thursday.
As
Mike Schuh reports, the city says it was forced to take action.
The building was vacated by Thursday evening.
A decade ago the city closed a stable and sent most of its arabbers' ponies here. But Thursday night, the last of the 50 were led away.
It was like they knew that they weren't coming back. The first horse balked at being loaded up.
They day was a far cry from when they pulled wagons around Baltimore. Their stables however are frightening. Fire traps waiting to collapse, the city-owned building was neglected and forgotten until inspectors had had enough.
In the end it was a jury-rigged electrical box that did it. It was too much of a hazard. Service was about to be shut off, and that brought about an emergency notice
Deputy Housing Commissioner Reggie Scribner's dad was an arabber.
"When you have a building that is structurally defective and you have the power turned off at the same time, obviously it becomes less than something we can work with," said Scribner.
Now the 50 horses are moving temporarily, 20 miles away. They are now going to Bowie, but they are only going to stay a couple of days because temporary stables are being built at Pimlico. But how long will they stay at Pimlico? Well that's a matter of trust between the arabbers and the city.
Pimlico is renting the stables for only 13 days. It's costing the city $18,000, and that's the challenge in finding a permanent solution.
But with only 8 to 20 arabbers in the city now, there is a suspicion--mayoral promises or not--that nothing will be done.
The Maryland Jockey Club donated today's transportation as well as the stabling at Bowie.
(© MMVII, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)