Sioux City: "It's Just a Bad Law"

Last fall, Sioux City hurried through a process, and ignored their local experts, and passed a new law regarding dogs in their community.  Among the laws was a ban on "pit bulls", and a changed policy on how the city dealt with "dangerous" dogs -- that all dogs accused of biting would be euthanized -- with no options for transfering the dogs from the city.

The city has had it's share of problems with the laws, including getting people to sign paperwork that signed over their guilt (which is unconstitutional), the local vet community deciding not to help them with breed identification for enforcing their 'pit bull' ban, animal control targeting those who spoke out against the ordinance (another violation of the constitution), and having one of the first dogs that was declared dangerous by the city for biting someone after the ordinance was passed being alabrador belonging to a city council member who was responsible for passing the law in the first place -- a dog that was later stolen from the city shelter.

So why would I not be surprised that the city is facing even MORE problems with their ordinance.

Currently, there are six people who have filed civil suits against the city for what they say were arbitrary decisions about the dogs beign "dangerous".   So while these suits tie up the court system, the dogs remain in the shelter for sim months to up to two years at a time on doggie death row waiting for the hearings to take place.

"I think the city does have to be concerned about it because animal control's having to provide shelter for these dogs and it's just something that's going to continue until there's some kind of resolution to it," said Martha McMinn, the attorney for the owners of the dogs. "Everyone agrees you shouldn't have vicious dogs out there biting people but this is so arbitrary."

Dogs affected by the new ordinance, including those confiscated due to the ban on 'pit bulls' now take up about 1/3 of the 52 kennel spaces in the Sioux City Animal Control Shelter and the shelter is struggling with overcrowding. "We're running out of room" said Cindy Rarrat, owner of the Sioux City Shelter.

Also interesting is that of the 6 dogs waiting on doggie death row, only one is actually a 'pit bull' -- with the others being a German Shepherd Mix, a Shar Pei, a Siberian Husky and a Great Dane. So why were 'pit bulls' singled out again?  They make up only a small percentage of the dogs that are accused of biting. 

Meanwhile, the amount of money the taxpayers are now paying for court rulings, holding the dogs, etc is mounting up tremendously.

"It's just a bad law and people are waking up to a lot of that," said Dennis Cloud, the owner of one of the dogs on death row.

I couldn't agree more.

 

Comments

[Vendetta]

We WILL fight these monsters in the city council. These fascist pigs will be thrown out of office onto the streets unless they repeal the law. We will not falter!

[Briana]

I couldn't agree more. I work for a Dog DNA testing company and we have to tell people all the time that:

I am sorry, but the lab will not screen for "Pit Bull" even though the technology exists. Unfortunately, it is quite a litigious and controversial breed; there are too many shelters and individuals who will test for the breed and euthanize the dog. We do not want to be a part of that practice.

If you do perform the test, and the dog is a "Pit", the test will not be able to identify it and therefore it will not show up in the test results. However, any other breed found in your dog that matches the breeds in our database will be reported. Our breed database can be found at: http://dog-dna.com/breeds.php

It is really sad that cities like this make that response necessary.