Newly revealed documents show that a plan for establishing standards for farrier education, testing and registration was largely developed by members of the Executive Committee of the American Farriers Association by late April 2004.

That plan was then given to a task force appointed months later, supposedly to study the issues.

The creation of the task force in July 2004 was itself kept from the organization’s Board of Directors in possible violation of AFA bylaws. The board represents the AFA’s 53 chapters in the United States and Canada, and thus is a direct link between the Executive Committee and AFA members.

The bylaws give AFA President Craig Trnka the authority to appoint an ad hoc task force or committee, but the Executive Committee also was involved in creating the task force, according to the July 2005 issue of the AFA’s No Foot No Horse newsletter. The bylaws require any Executive Committee actions to be announced at the next Board of Directors meeting.

That did not happen. The minutes of the board’s meeting in October 2004 make no mention of the creation of the Farrier Education/Registration Task Force.

Public Airing

The Executive Committee announced at the board’s February 2005 meeting that the task force had been appointed in mid-2004 to study the issues related to farrier education and registration. The task force then introduced what was billed as its own nine-point plan for achieving standardized farrier training, competency testing and registration.

The task force proposals were essentially the same as the…