Horse urine-gate is just getting stronger, and much weirder as the critics come forward. Right now, the story is that horse urine is ruining Chicago streets, so the city put an ordinance on the books that horse carriage operators (not sure about mounted police) will have to spray a substance on any horse urine that is expelled under their ownership/control. But the fight over horse waste isn’t new.

Dan Sampson runs Noble Horse, one of the horse carriage companies that operates downtown. He was able to shine quite a bit of light on the history of this story, going all the way back to the Jane Byrne era. Here he is talking about how he prepared to introduce horse carriages to downtown Chicago. Which might be the best sound bite in history:

From there, Sampson said he had to enlist the help of an Amish man in Indiana to create a harness to control the poop. One small problem: Sampson said former Alderman Burt Natarus stole all the credit for the harness.

No way. I can’t believe it. The famed quote from Natarus about horse diapers is a fake? He stole the idea? I have to call Mr. Natarus.

Sampson moved on from who stole the horse diaper idea and got to the meat of the new ordinance: he said horse urine doesn’t even smell. Just look at their diet.

What, they aren’t feeding the horses Beefarino? “Rusty, No!!!!!”

Sampson’s thinking of suing the city to get the courts to undo this ordinance. Because horse urine and horse dung clean-up is tailor-made for circuit court.

Finally, Sampson weighs in on what is on everyone is wondering: What’s Rahm think of the horse urine ordinance?

And holding his nose.

Tony Arnold contributed to this blog. Actually, he pretty much did all the work, I just slapped in the snark. Photo above of Noble Horse stables, by Samuel Love/Flickr.