Ramapo, NY – Health Commissioner Wants Annual Kappores Schlagen Scrutinized

    19

    Ramapo, NY – The Rockland Commissioner of Health directed officials today to find out where a Jewish group was planning on holding its annual chicken ritual and to meet with organizers to try to prevent the unsanitary conditions that have led to fines in the past.

    Join our WhatsApp group

    Subscribe to our Daily Roundup Email


    “Let’s get in touch with them and see what the plan is,” Commissioner Joan Facelle directed health inspectors at the monthly meeting of the Board of Health.

    A Monsey man who organizes the ceremony for Ramapo’s large Jewish population has been fined three years in a row for not adequately cleaning up chicken entrails, feces, carcasses, feet and blood in kapparot ceremonies in Monsey.

    Much of the previous years’ fines remain unpaid, health officials said.

    Members of the Rockland Department of Health said they have met with organizers in previous years to explain the sanitary code requirements and suggest ways to perform the ritual while still complying with regulations.

    Those meetings have had little effect, health officials told Facelle.

    Read more in the The Journal News


    Listen to the VINnews podcast on:

    iTunes | Spotify | Google Podcasts | Stitcher | Podbean | Amazon

    Follow VINnews for Breaking News Updates


    Connect with VINnews

    Join our WhatsApp group


    19 Comments
    Most Voted
    Newest Oldest
    Inline Feedbacks
    View all comments
    Anonymous
    Anonymous
    13 years ago

    The anti religious police is out in full force

    Anonymous
    Anonymous
    13 years ago

    What do you expect from a bunch of slobs?

    13 years ago

    #1 . These people break the law and leave a filthy mess. What do you expect. #2 is correct. These people are slobs.

    Anonymous
    Anonymous
    13 years ago

    dont be an idiot and be a mench for a change and you wont get fined

    13 years ago

    Reply to #1 :
    Not every action concerning Yidden is antisemitic. If you break the law, be prepared to face the consequences.

    13 years ago

    I agree 100% with the commisioner: my daughter got campylobacter from the chickens here in Monsey. Until we found out what she contracted from the chickens (yes it did land on her face) we asked the organizer to find out which farm the chickens came from and he was of no help!!!. My daughter was 6 months at the time. It was horrible: she lost weight and cried for 2 weeks straight ( yom Kippur and Succos) I didn’t report to the department of health because I don’t want to help the Bnei Amim to cancel such a holy minhag either. For us – we started using $18.00 instead.

    shredready
    shredready
    13 years ago

    #8

    the only problem with your logic is that you might be putting others at danger

    13 years ago

    I lived very close to one of the previous sites and was embarrassed by the mess that was left. There was still blood and feathers weeks afterwards. Why can’t we cooperate and clean up so as not to have a health hazard? It’s not just the goyim who get sick, I know of many of us who did also. It is certainly NOT anti semitic for the health department to want to help us with our holiday and protect ALL citizens. We should pay the fines and have this ceremony legally. What’s the big deal to follow rules?

    Ahuvah54
    Ahuvah54
    13 years ago

    In my whole adult life I have only used money. I may be on a low level, but to me it’s ba’al tzarei chaim. (Not the schechting, the conditions in which the chickens are kept beforehand.) But for those who do it, to leave a mess is to miss the chance to make a kiddush Hashem. Hope this year is different.

    13 years ago

    Ramapo County should sue the offenders in Civil Court, regarding unpaid past fines. Unfortunately, over the years, we have seen other businesses which ignore local health department warnings and regulations, and wind up getting closed. For example, the Tamarack Hotel and the camp which was on the site of the Homowack Hotel.

    Anonymous
    Anonymous
    13 years ago

    There is clear precedent from chazal that one is yotzeh the mitzvah of shlaggen kaporos using a fish. This is much more hygienic and less offensive to the community than using a dirty and smelly chicken.

    Greener
    Greener
    13 years ago

    yotzeh the mitzvah? what mitzvah, at most a minhag. see the plain shulchan aruch (not the ramah) – no chicken, no fish, money if you feel you must do something.

    shredready
    shredready
    13 years ago

    to harav hagadol number 12:
    “Also, if one does kaporos with this man, it gets negated by the mess and chillul hashem.” what is your halachic source outside your standard that if the Chassidim do it, it has to be bad?

    taking it to the logical conclusion: If I do a mitzvah let’s say go to shul and doven and someone else does a chillul HaShem – they were talking in the same shul that I was in. is my mitzvah negated also?

    well from your comment I am confident your are not a harav hagadol.

    The two issues are not the same
    every person who does kappross at that place is added to the filth therefore adds to chilul hashem. In addition since this guy has been sighted the last few years with leaving a filthy place, there is no reason to think that this year will be diffrent, and again a chilul hashem

    Raphael_Kaufman
    Raphael_Kaufman
    13 years ago

    Just a note on tzar b’alei chaim. Contrary to what some posters seem to believe, tzar b’alei chaim is not a blanket prohibition of causing pain and suffering to an animal. It is a prohibition of causing UNNECESSARY pain and suffering. In the case of kapores, since the chicken is being necessarily used for a davar b’kedushah, tzar b’alei chaim does not apply.

    I must also note that, while those who perform kapores with a live chicken or fish have strong psak upon which to rely, there is equally strong halachic support for shlogging kapores with money or not shlogging kapores altogether.

    Shmuel
    Shmuel
    13 years ago

    #7 , yours is too convenient of a story to be true, it sounds like a story some “imaginative” people, or small children, often make up to illustrate their points. I highly doubt it.