Chicago was founded by fur traders. Now, it might soon kick them out.
An ordinance banning the sale of new fur products advanced in the City Council Tuesday, setting up a final vote as soon as next week.
Ald. Raymond Lopez, the ban’s author, hopes the move will stifle the “barbaric and inhumane” fur industry, and said existing furriers need to evolve.
“We know we can transition away from formerly-live fur products,” Lopez, 15th, told aldermen.
But Ald. Matt O’Shea, 19th, and two furriers in his Southwest Side ward warned the ban would be the end of their businesses.
“They are family-owned. They have created jobs for residents in my community. They have contributed to our tax base,” O’Shea said. “They will close. People will be out of jobs.”
Lopez is the latest Chicago City Council member to court controversy with a proposal aimed at animals’ rights. North Side Ald. Joe Moore in 2006 got the council to ban foie gras, prohibiting restaurants from serving the delicacy made by force-feeding ducks and geese to enlarge their livers.
Mayor Richard M. Daley at the time called the foie gras ban “the silliest law the City Council has ever passed” and warned it would hurt economic development. Two years later, restaurateur Ald. Tom Tunney led a successful effort to overturn it.
Lopez’s ban does not outlaw leather, cowhide or deerskin products. It also makes exceptions to allow the sale of second-hand fur products, as well as new fur products used in religious and cultural practices.
After the License and Consumer Protection Committee approved the ordinance in a split voice vote, O’Shea predicted the ban would only shift existing fur sales to Chicago suburbs.
“We need to do more to attract businesses, to support the businesses we have,” he said. “This is going to do nothing for those that want to stop animal fur from being sold.”
A representative of Angelo’s Leather and Fur in Oak Lawn declined to comment on the ban. He was too busy handling a going-out-of-business sale, he said.
Gerard Butler, owner of Island Furs in Chicago, shared a simple prediction Tuesday on what the ban would mean for his 31-year-old Beverly store: “We wouldn’t exist.”
The fur business is the only work Butler, 60, has ever known, he said. His Southwest Side store employs as many as five people, depending on the season, as it makes and repairs fur garments.
He sees the ban as an attack on his “art form” — and free expression. He likened the effort to banning books, history or dance.
“I think it’s a travesty,” Butler said. “People who don’t like furs, we understand, that’s your choice. That’s what makes this country great: choice.”
Eight blocks north, Cherry Tebyanian predicted a fur ban would also put her store, Adriana Furs, out of business.
“This is devastating,” she said. “For 38 years we have been up and running. All of a sudden they want to ban fur coats. Why?”
She defended the morality of the industry, citing the use of farm-raised animals. There have been “ups and downs” in recent years, including when the store was robbed during the pandemic. But people still buy the warm furs from her and her 15 employees, she said.
“We are providing jobs to people. And we are also helping our community,” she said. “Everybody should be allowed to do business, regardless of what kind of business they’re doing. Nobody should control you, how you live your life,”
Asked about the possibility of store closures, Lopez defended the ban as “just the natural evolution of business.” Six furriers remain in Chicago, he said.
“If they refuse to evolve, they are going to put themselves out of business,” Lopez said. “There is nothing saying that they have to sell their shop. There is nothing saying that they can’t sell alternative fur products.”
There is already a large shift away from natural fur products, and most Americans do not support fur sales, he added.
