The wide-open West has a long tradition of respecting other people’s choices. It’s a live-and-let-live lifestyle that says my neighbors can live their lives according to their own beliefs while I make my own choices—so long as we don’t trample on each other’s rights.

That Colorado way of life is under attack in a particularly repugnant initiative on Denver’s November ballot. An outside organization that doesn’t like the fact that you eat meat has parachuted into Denver. Their members don’t eat meat, and they believe that you shouldn’t, either. The stated goal of the organization funding this ban is to “reverse the cultural norm of eating animals.”

Of course, they couldn’t put that on Denver ballots. A measure like that would be soundly rejected. Instead, the measure makes a simple and seemingly innocuous request: Ban slaughterhouses in Denver. Many voters may look at that and think “Do we even have any slaughterhouses in Denver?”

We do: It’s a 70-year-old, employee-owned business, the only one targeted by this ban.

Superior Farms, located in North Denver, produces about 20 percent of the nation’s lamb products. It’s a leading facility in the nation’s food chain, a source of local food for restaurants, food trucks, and groceries here in Colorado, and an essential industry in a long proud history of meat production in Denver. It has been employee-owned for about 40 years, and produces 100% Halal-certified meat for the Islamic market. Many people may not know that Denver is home to this facility, but the 160 employee-owners who work there take great pride in their company, in their work, and in their product.

When I first learned of the slaughterhouse ban, I thought surely this is absurd. We can actually vote somebody’s livelihood out of existence? Not to fear, the initiative’s language says the city should offer these newly unemployed workers training in some other job. In a recent interview, one of the organizers of the ban stated that the workers, many of whom have been there for decades, “could do construction or different types of jobs.” The utter arrogance is beyond belief.

Singling out a facility and forcing its employees to shut down a business they own is wrong. It does not deserve to be run out of town by a group that isn’t even from Denver. Many people may not know the ins and outs of how a slaughterhouse works, but it’s worth understanding that USDA inspectors are present at all times. Production cannot happen without inspectors on-site. And the facility, like all working animal production facilities in the U.S., is heavily regulated by federal mandates. Furthermore, Halal certification requires humane treatment throughout the entire lifecycle of the animal. Many voters may not know all this, but they should before they decide whether or not to shut it all down.

I’d add that the 160 mostly Latino workers own the company. With their safety and security on the line, you can bet that they take great care in both the way their plant operates, and the way in which they are compensated for their labor. These are skilled jobs, with good benefits and ownership stakes. This ban will rob them of their hard-earned equity, leaving them only with a paternalistic promise that we’ll “prioritize” training you for some other job.

The slaughterhouse ban is opposed by a big-tent coalition of ranchers, restaurateurs and labor unions who believe it’s wrong for animal welfare, wrong for workers, and wrong for the consumers who will face higher prices for lamb products imported from farther away. As it happens, the second-largest producer of lamb is all the way in New Zealand. Forcing local food production out of Denver isn’t going to mean Denverites stop eating meat, it just means we’ll be burning more fuel to bring meat here. Wrong approach.

I don’t know about you, but I’m awfully tired of people who get upset that I don’t make the same choices they do. It’s wrong to try to change the law to impose those personal preferences on others, but it’s downright egregious to put 160 hard-working people out of work in the process. This November, let’s defeat the slaughterhouse ban.

Kevin Flynn represents District 2 on the Denver City Council.