New School fights to drown out old, out-dated way of thinking in Toledo and in the entire state of Ohio

Two contradicting schools of thought were on display in Ohio yesterday. While it seems clear that new, logically thinking will eventually win out over old-school thinking, the Old-Schoolers are not going down without a bit of a fight.

This week, Lucas County, OH's new dog warden, Julie Lyle, took over as the new county dog warden.

Thirty six hours into her job, she got to create her first controversy when she stopped the "euthanasia" of six 'pit bulls' that were scheduled to be killed. Lyle said that Amos was a lovely dog, and she did not wish to kill him, but her hands were tied by the county's policy that prevents 'pit bulls' from being adopted and her administrations self-imposed 30 day ban against Lyle making any operational changes.

County Adiminstrator Peter Ujvagi instructed Lyle to continue on with the current policy until the 30-day window is up to make changes. Of the 30 day policy, Ujvagi said ther is nothin unsual about the waiting period and "the idea was to give her the opportunity to be able to learn and undertand the operations of the dog warden's office, weigh them, and make recommendations. She needs to be given a chance to be able to succeed in her job."

My initial reaction is amazement. My presumption is that the county hired Lyle because of her experience, and that based on that experience, would be able to make this sort of policy recommendation without even setting foot inside the shelter first. If the administration really does want to set a positive tone for reducing the killing in the shelter, then they should allow Lyle to set that tone from day one -- and not spend 30 days killing 'pit bulls' because of an old, outdate policy set up by her predecessor.

I'm not the only one who thinks so.

County Commissioner Ben Konap emailed Ujvagi to get him to suspend the 30 day policy on no changes. Dr. David Grossman, a member of the dog warden advisory committee that recommended the hiring of Lyle who also serves on the County Health Commission also criticized the decision. Ujvagi's decision to not allow Lyle to make changes was also criticized by Tamara Ernst, founder of 4 Lucas County Pets and Jean Keating, co-founder of Ohio Coalition of Dog Advocates. "We did a very good job of weeding through the candidates and picking a candidate that I have full confidence in, that is going to make the changes the community wants to see happen in Lucas County," Keating said. "We need to let her do her job."

Meanwhile, all of the candidates for the upcoming County Commissioner's race also expressed the desire to let Lyle change the policy -- including Republican Andy Glenn, George Sarantou and Dan Steingraber and Democrats Mike Zychowicz, Ben Krompak, Earl Murry, Tim Porter, Art Jones and Carol Contrada. All of their comments can be found here (it's worth the read).  Current county commissioner Peter Gerken supported the decision to continue the killing for 30 days.

The Toledo Blade also ran an editorial criticizing Ujvagi's decision.

While it seems clear that a new breed of politicians is in place to replace the old-school, outdated thinking and catch-and-kill philosphy of their predecessors, it looks like the old school is hanging onto their outdated policies with their final grasp. The changes are coming...and inevitable.

*****

Meanwhile, in Columbus,the House Agriculture and Natural Resource Committee heard discussion about repealing the state's 23 year old policy that automatically declares 'pit bulls' as "vicious". The bill, HB 79, was proposed by Rep. Barbara Spears (among others). 

Former Lucas County Dog Warden, Tom Skeldon -- part of the old-school group and who resigned under political scrutiny last fal - was in attendence to push for the law to remain as-is. I think the fact that his own community decided they were tired of his way of thinking should be a strong signal to the politicians in Columbus of what direction they should go with the law. As the Blade's editorial says:

"Remarkably, Mr. Skeldon was in Columbus yesterday, begging a legislative committee on behalf of the Ohio Dog Warden's Association to keep the state's medieval laws concerning "vicious" breeds. Rather than a credible authority, he stands for everything that's wrong about animal control."

I couldn't have said it better myself.

More on both issues from the folks at BAD RAP

Comments

[EmilyS]

just shaking head in disbelief. They knew Lyle intended to stop wantonly killing pit bulls when they hired her... "old guard" or an attempt to make her job morally impossible for her and force to quit? Thank goodness the good guys are still on the case.

[Brad Jensen]

County policy currently prevents the adoption of Pits but it doesn't prevent the fostering or transfer of them does it?

[Brent]

Brad,

I'm not sure exactly how the policy is worded. But yeah, I can't imagine that with a brand new shelter director that doesn't want to kill these dogs and so much outcry against the policy that this will hold up. But the old school is hanging on with all they've got.

[Bryan]

I just started following this blog a week ago. Keep up the good work. You guys are awesome.

A 30 day policy is nothing but a leash meant to allow her bosses time to influence her decision making process. It sounds like Mrs. Lyle knows the difference between right and wrong and might actually have the gumption to live by it.

www.theacrimoniousk9.com

[MichelleD]

Someone in OH should start a FB Fan page in support of Julie Lyle. These types of FB groups/pages have caught the attention of the media in many instances. I would start one but as an outsider it won't have as much effect. Hmmm, maybe I'll do it anyway if someone doesn't run with it...

[EmilyS]

Michelle, that's a great idea!

[pitbull friend]

Hmmm. I wonder whether Skeldon's showing up actually might have a negative effect on what he's trying to promote. I mean, isn't he so universally loathed that he's going to remind them, "Oh, yeah, there's that guy who all of the nice folks in Toledo hate?" Or maybe that's just my hopefulness talking.

[EmilyS]

Julie (with Konop) may have won this!
http://abclocal.go.com/wtvg/story?section=resources/lifestyle_community/pets&id=7390394

Could be that the haters in Toledo went one innocent puppy too far...

[CaptBarbosa]

I love pits and I dont like policies that say to kill something strictly based on breeds, BUT the reaility is pits or pit types are hard to adopt and a risk(if nothing else public opinion of pits make them a risk) No body wants to adopt large adult breeds, no one wants black dogs esp large black dogs. So, if some dog has to be euthed, then why hang onto the ones no one is going to adopt and will sit for years taking up space? The needs of the many outweigh those or the few. The choice to euth should be based on adoptability, space and the left up to the people who know and work with the dogs at the shelter

[Brent]

Capt. Barbosa,

I don't buy the "no one wants black dogs esp large black dogs" type of nonsense. For nearly 30 years, one of the most popular breeds in the United States has been the Labrador Retriever - who's most common color is black. The reason shelters have historically had so many large black dogs was because large black dogs were the most common dog out there...which means MANY people wanted them.

"Pit bulls" are essentially the same. They are an extremely popular type of dog now and thus, there are a lot of them in the shelter. But it makes no sense at all to just kill all of them that come in without making efforts to adopt them to the public first.

I agree that if a shelter must make the decision to kill dogs in the shelter, then it makes the most sense to kill the less-adoptable dogs. But I think shelters by and large have perpetuated the idea that no one wants to adopt 'pit bulls' or 'big black dogs' in spite of these two types of dogs being the most popular types of OWNED dogs in the country. It doesn't compute.

[Ila S]

>They are an extremely popular type of dog now and thus, there are a lot of them in the shelter.
There are a lot in the shelter because people are hounded who own these dogs, not because they are not good pets but simply owning one makes one a criminal.

It appears that Peter Ujvagi is making sure that less are owned. Can an elected official be fired? Of course guess he is against farmers too. We need to give Ms. Lyle a chance before she is run out of her job. In some areas 5-6000 of these dogs have been killed just for being a certain breed not because they did anything wrong. So what is right about this? Wonder if Mr. Ujvagi has kept up with the Vick dogs? Remember HSUS wanted all these dogs killed too and all but one are healthy, happy, and "good dogs"!