Let's just dive right in:
Cities and laws
A Seattle, WA councilor is looking to ban certain breeds of dogs from city parks.
The dangerous dog law committee in Jasper, AL has come back with a recommendation for BSL
Glidden, IA, is considering a dangerous dog law that could be breed-specific.
Dog Bites and Attacks
A Schenectady, NY woman suffered some pretty significant injuries after she was attacked by two "pit bulls' that were roaming at large in the community. This is a very poverty stricken area of Schenectady, with over 45% of the people living in this zip code living below the poverty level (the state average is 14%) and 25% living on an income 50% below the poverty line (state average is 6%). The woman is going to be ok, which is great news.
An 8 year old, Olathe, KS boy was taken to the hospital after being attacked by what is being called a Boxer-Shar Pei mix (I question the breed ID here, but am relieved the're not calling the dog a 'pit bull' because it definitely isn't that either). The dog was on a chain and the boy was playing near the dog when the dog broke free from the chain and attacked the boy. The dog was young, only about 11 months, and was no doubt getting very excited (and frustrated) by the playing boy which likely led up to the attack.
A Fenton, MI boy was bitten multiple times by an Australian Shepherd. The dog was being walked by an 11 year old girl and the 7 year old victim walked up to the dog. The girl told the boy not to pet the dog (the dog was apparently growling at the boy) but the boy ignored both the dog's and the little girl's warning and tried to pet the dog anyway, and was bitten multiple times by the dog.
While the Australian governments have been going crazy talking about what to do about "pit bulls', a 77 year old woman was attacked by two stray German Shepherds that broke into her sunroom. Most of the article is still about the 'pit bull' attack that happened last week however.
A 6 year old Genesee County (MI) boy was attacked by a Shar-Pei. There aren't a lot of details around the attack, although it's worth noting that the dog's owner was arrested earlier this month in connection to stealing a motor vehicle. The newspaper has decided to create more hysteria by asking the question of whether the community should have a breed-specific law and whether or not Shar Pei's should be added to the list.
Kansas City News
Some volunteers at the Kansas City, MO shelter were fired this week after some conflicts with them and the city staff over what was perceived to be improper veterinary care for sick animals in the shelter. City leadership says there are no disease problems at the shelter, but the photos tell a bit of a different story. KCMO is about 1 month from having new leadership at the shelter, and it just can't happen too soon for the animals down there.
Meanwhile, in Independence, the project for a new shelter that serves Easter Jackson County has fallen behind because the contractor chosen by the county was unable to get a performance Bond after it was awared the contract in May. So the County must find another bidder to work on the shelter.
In Kansas City, apparently a person's dog wandered over onto a neighbor's front porch. The dog's owner appologized for his dog getting loose and apparently thought the issue was resolved, but apparently not so much. The neighbor responded to the dog being on his porch and the subsequent appology by shooting the dog's owner -- killing him.
The UK
A newspaper asks "What use is our dangerous dog law?" after yet another attack in the country that the national breed ban has not prevented.
Here is yet another incident in the UK -- this one by a Bull Mastiff.
No Kill News
San Antonio is holding onto its dream of becoming a no kill city. In 2006, the city was killing 90% of the animals that came into the shelter, now it's "down" to 69%. They should be able to look just down the highway to Austin on a great example of how to realize the success they're seeking...
Miscellaneous
If you haven't seen this photograph yet, or read the story, please do so now. It's an image captured at the funeral of one of our Navy SEALS who was killed in Afghanistan. The image is of the man's dog that walked up and laid next to the casket of his fallen owner. Nothing captures the heart of the human/canine bond like this image.
Much has been written over at Yesbiscuit! about the failings of the Memphis Animal Shelter. So Mayor AC Wharton decided to allow the local Rotary Club to do an audit of the shelter. The Rotary Club seemed like an odd choice from the get-go, since, well, they don't really have animal shelter experience. But it's a start, right? Well, turns out it was a bit of cronyism as the Rotary Club president and Mr. Wharton are good friends....as we find out when said President was arrested for a DUI, public intoxication and Reckless driving -- and during the arrest, continued to ask to speak to Mayor Wharton.
A Chicago Family was awarded $333,000 after police officers raided their South Side home and shot their dog in a search that led to no criminal activity being discovered. It seems like for years officers have been getting by with the shoot-the-dog-first attitude and it is nice to see the courts start compensating the victims in these situations -- so that hopefully it will lead to officers doing what they can to spare the lives of the family pets.
Blogs
Proposed changes after HSUS Evaluation of Dallas Animal Services - YesBiscuit! provides some commentary of the HSUS evaluation of the Dallas Shelter including a lot of focus on how animals should be killed and little emphasis on how they could be saved.
How we could cover storms - This post isn't dog-related, but it's some commentary about how the news media COULD cover major storms like Hurricane Irene. I think it's interesting the blog's focus on reporters repeating the same hysteria instead of, well, reporting. This is an issue that has bugged me for a very long time but I thought this was a smart post on the topic.
Sit, Stay...Detect? -- A good post by NAIA on the many abilities dogs have shown, including their ability to detect Cancer.
The ups, downs and fun of fostering -- this post specifically is about fostering 'pit bull' type dogs -- from HugABull
How to save a life through dog fostering -- another great post on the importance of fostering -- this one from Love and a Six foot leash.
Street Dogs Debate -- a thoughtful look at Street Dogs from Dancing Dog Blog
Weasel Words - Saving Pets has all of the quotes by the scientific community, dog training community, and veterinary community following a tragic attack in Australia -- and then the fear mongering, knee jerk reactions that are ignoring the experts in the field by the state politicians.
Dangerous Dog Evaluations -- this is an older post by Jim Crosby about evaluations of dangerous dogs and whether we can, or should, rehabilitate these dogs. It's a good post. One thing that as we continue to move toward no kill communities we can, should and must start rehabilitating these dogs. In some communities where kill rates are still very high, it may not make sense to invest a lot of resources on one dog....for now. But as we eye the future, we very much should be considering it.
Size matters, but so does how you use it -- Winograd looks at mandatory hold times in various states -- and not only does the he advocate for longer hold times, but also for better use of those hold times in terms of finding the owners of these pets.
Excitement is building as Twin Cities move closer to no kill - Animal Ark has the details on positive progress in the Twin Cities area.
The Idiot Whisperer -- Some funny Cesar Milan Parody from over at Seattle Dog Spot
Breeders, dog shows and the German Shepherd -- The Poodle and Dog Blog has a quick photo essay of what is wrong with how the breed clubs are breeding show GSDs right now.
Is food to expensive? And what that says about our respect for animals -- A good blog post from Dr. Khuly about our food supply and what it says about our respect for animals.
How desperate must a surrendering owner be to escape judgment -- love this post from YesBiscuit!
Putting NYC Animal Care and Control out of its misery - -Micah Kellner
You write the best, most informative dog blog out there!
Posted by: Kelly | August 28, 2011 at 11:38 AM
Not only is it morally repugnant for KCMO to fire volunteers for speaking out about inhumane conditions, it is a violation of federal law.
A civil rights lawsuit against the City would get their attention: http://www.nokilladvocacycenter.org/pdf/Sec1983_000.pdf
Hoping this could find its way to the fired volunteers.
Posted by: Nathan Winograd | August 28, 2011 at 12:06 PM
Thanks Kelly. Very kind.
Agreed Nathan -- and that information already has found its way to the volunteers.
Posted by: Brent | August 28, 2011 at 12:09 PM
As usual, Brent, excellent roundup. Thanks for putting it all in one spot for the rest of us.
I'm laughing, even though it's NOT funny, about the KCMO shelter "firing the volunteers". there are volunteer jobs from which we've been trying to get fired for some time now. ;-)
I was in Topeka when the story broke about the Shar-Pei/Boxer mix dog bite in Olathe. My traveling buddy and I said the same thing - "it will be pit bull before it's over with". It kind of looked like a Great Dane...something mix to me. I saw no Boxer or Shar-Pei in there, but who knows?
The best news of the week was the civil action in Chicago where the family was awarded 300K for the police shooting their Labrador - particularly after one of the boys specifically asked if they could put the dog up when the SWAT Welcome Wagon arrived. The plaintiffs must have been some sort of minority and the action must have been one of those federal "1983"/civil rights violation suits. If something like that ever happens at this house I know I will end up dead, so plan on coming over to get my 25 years worth of "dog files", Brent! :-)
"How we cover storms..." Good grief! Can we have a moratorium on the stupid reporter standing in the howling wind/rain on the beach during a hurricane? Just once I'd like to see one of those idiots go right over the seawall and get carried away. Extra points if a Great White grabs them and it ends up on "Shark Week"!
And as for the article about "Is food too expensive, etc." - that's just so much liberal drivel. If anyone thinks our animal agriculture is so horrible go someplace like, oh, Somalia and see what you think of their program. Planes leave daily! Our animal agriculture programs in our universities are the finest in the world and in case the "love and kisses" crowd missed it, we're feeding over 300 million people and part of the rest of the world.
Posted by: kmk | August 29, 2011 at 08:48 AM
Wow, I went and watched the video about the KCMO shelter. "At first they were happy when the city took over the shelter..." - kind of falls into the category of "never wish for what you want, or you will surely get it".
The situation with the Independence, MO shelter is extremely frustrating. The county agreed to issue approx.) 5.3 million in bonds to pay for the shelter. All five or six bids that came back initially were over that amount, and were anywhere from about 7 million to close to ten million dollars. So, it was put out on bid again and now the winning contractor can't get a performance bond???? This is particularly frustrating because we're mired in a bad economy and NO ONE is building commercial buildings. One would think companies would be bending over backwards to get this contract. We've been perplexed by this from the get-go.
Posted by: kmk | August 29, 2011 at 09:02 AM
i agree that the boxer x sharpei doesn't look anything like a 'pei'. probably some mastiff in there
I take the Animal Ark article about the Twin Cities with a grain of salt. Mike Fry is notorious for spreading mis-information about Animal Humane Society. i notice his article fails to mention that AHS routinely takes dogs and cats from St. Paul Animal Control and Minneapolis Animal Control. In fact, i was at SPAC last week (i occassionally pull for a local rescue) and AHS had 5 dogs flagged to pull and 4 cats.
He's also guilty of turning customers away (they are not an open admission shelter- which i'm fine with, to each their own) but then referring the customer to AHS.
AHS has it's faults, but looks like they're moving in the right direction in spite of Animal Ark's underhanded mission of mis-information
Posted by: Anne | August 29, 2011 at 01:35 PM
I enjoyed the article on Dangerous Dog Evaluations. One thing I wish it would have mentioned is that a dog who feels that he must bite people all the time is NOT a happy dog, that is a dog under a great deal of stress. When decided on whether we can fix a dangerous dog, we need to evaluate to things: Can we keep people safe from this dog? and, does/will this dog have quality of life? (and yes, people come first. Regardless of what the ARs say ;)).
Posted by: CristyF | August 30, 2011 at 06:24 PM