KC DOG BLOG

Why Animal Welfare Advocates Should Vote for Jolie Justus for Mayor of Kansas City

On Tuesday, June 18th, there is an important mayoral election in Kansas City. While mayoral campaigns are full of promises, many of which will never come true, I think it's often best to look at what the candidate HAS ALREADY DONE during their time in office.

In this case, for my animal welfare-conscious friends in Kansas City, the choice to vote for Jolie Justus is clear. Justus has been a consistent and clear voice on the challenges facing the city's animal welfare policies. And I know these policies are important to many Kansas City residents -- as two years ago 70% of Kansas Citians voted for a tax increase to build a new city animal shelter (with very high voter turnouts, driven by a large volume of animal welfare voters). Meanwhile citizens in Kansas City donate 3x the money for animal sheltering services as the city allocates -- I can't think of another city service where people willingly pay more.

During her past 4 years on the city council, Justus has:

• Advocated for the building of a new animal shelter  - which will finish construction late this year.

• Led the changing of city ordinances to allow for pets on patios at bars and restaurants. This was in response to city staff suddenly deciding to enforce a piece of the health code that prohibited animals on patios where food was served. Justus listened to her constituents (residents, business owners, non-profits) and worked with city staff to ensure the new code provided fair safety measures and was inclusive enough for fundraising and fostering events held at area bars and restaurants.

• Justus co-sponsored a resolution that guarantees the city's commitment to remaining a no kill community. Resolution 17058 states the "Kansas City Animal Shelter shall forever continue to save the lives of healthy and treatable dogs, cats and other animals by maintaining a 90% or more live release rate."  This resolution actually had 11 sponsors; incidentally Justus's opponent was not one of them.

• Justus also helped work through city codes so that BarK could open. BarK is a now-nationally recognized bar/restaurant/dog park on the city's riverfront that is a wonderful place for the city's pet owners. Anyone that has tried to open a business in this city has first hand knowledge of the massive amount of red tape it involves. Tack onto that adding dogs and food into the mix. Justus gets that pets are an economic development opportunity - something most candidates overlook even though we're in the heart of the Animal Health Corridor.

• Sponsored a resolution that the city audit their troubled animal control department. The audit highlighted dozens of areas needing improvement in the city's animal control division.

• Justus also sponsored a resolution to direct the city manager to pursue the privatization of the animal control field services in an effort to help reform that troubled department. 

• Justus and her wife, Lucy, personally saved a hard luck dog that arrived at KC Pet Project, and orchestrated a rescue of two tame ducks that were left out at Penn Valley Lake. Animal Control was unable to capture the ducks, but Justus and others rallied to get them to safety. 

Prior to joining the city council, Justus served as a State Senator in Jefferson City. While there:

• Justus sponsored the very first breed-specific legislation preemption bill in the state. 

• When Missouri's Prop B passed, the state legislature repealed the ordinance. However, Justus worked with advocates to ensure key provisions were added to state code in order to help stop the worst of the state's commercial breeding issues. One of those provisions gave the State Attorney General power to prosecute neglectful commercial breeders when local law enforcement failed to act. She also worked to get over a million dollars added for enforcement. These changes led to the immediate closure of more than a dozen of the worst offenders in the state. 

Beyond animal welfare issues, a few other things of note Justus has accomplished:

• Provided pro-bono legal services to countless kids in foster care, giving her a lot of knowledge of the challenges faced by some of the most vulnerable people in Kansas City.

• Has been a tireless advocate for small businesses.
  • Whisker's Cat Cafe, BarK and restaurants that cater to dog owners on patios (such as Char-Bar and dozens of others) are mentioned above.
  • Fought to allow Tom's Town Tavern to be able to sell more than just two types of wine (which was being contested by a singular property owner in the area).
  • Changed ordinances to allow Cellar Rat, a local packaged liquor retailer, to sell individual pours of wine at their location, something previously prohibited.
  • Led ordinance revisions that allowed for the opening of Howard's as a self-serve grocery store and another that allowed International Tap House to open with a patio. 

• She also led the city's anti-violence task force.
• She also led the city's work in saving the Mayor's airport SNAFU. Due to Justus' leadership 75% of Kansas Citians voted to move forward on the building of a new airport after significant early pushback.

This is why Michelle and I are voting for Jolie Justus. And if others care about moving Kansas City's animal welfare (and many other) issues forward, they should vote for her too. Kansas City has come a long way in the past 8 years with regards to animal welfare issues. The shelter is performing better, a new shelter is under construction, and overall, the welfare of pets has improved a lot in Kansas City, but many challenges remain. The opening of the new shelter will bring with it many new challenges. The city's animal ordinances badly need revising. And the city's animal control field services badly need new leadership. 65% of households in our neighborhoods own one or more pets - these issues are important to a large constituency.

The city needs a mayor who will have these issues on their radar and push things forward. No one in the mayor's race is more qualified to lead this city for the next for years than Justus. And we're voting for her not just because of what she says she will do, but because of what she has already proven she will do and has already done. #JustusLeague

Late Night Musings: Leading by example and the changing image of pit bulls (and cats!) in communities

Last week, Kansas City, Kansas repealed its 29 year old ban on pit bulls. In the process, KCK joined 27 other cities in Kansas, and 25 in Missouri in repealing its laws. One of the more recent repeals was Liberty, MO, which became the first community in the United States (to the best that I can tell) to repeal a ban by popular vote of its citizens. Liberty joined 24 other Missouri Communities who have repealed their decades-old breed bans. 

This type of progress would have been almost impossible to have imagined just 12 years ago. 

So what's changed? 

I'm convinced that the changing views of animal sheltering and the animal welfare community have been a key driver.

In Kansas City, MO for example, prior to 2009 pit bulls were never put up for adoption at the city shelter. They were killed as a matter of shelter policy unless they were pulled by one of the handful of rescues that rescued pit bull type dogs.

This changed dramatically in 2012, when Kansas City Pet Project took over the operations of the shelter. Since that time, Kansas City Pet Project has saved and adopted out more than 6,000 pit bulls into the community. Other shelters, including the shelter in Independence, MO began doing the same type of adoptions under the leadership of the Great Plains SPCA.

This has had a tremendous impact on the perceptions of pit bulls in the community. The volume of adoptions has increased the number of owners of pit bulls substantially. These owners impact perceptions of their neighbors with their daily interactions. It's also impacted volunteers. Theses shelters now welcome hundreds of volunteers annually who interact with the dogs at the shelters -- many of them pit bulls. And this forever changes these volunteer's perceptions as well. 

And their perception becomes what is real -- that pit bulls are just dogs. They aren't "other". They play, and romp, and rest and do all of the things dogs do. And people love them for that. And it's changing perceptions -- at the public level first, then within city leadership. But it has been the animal welfare community's leadership and commitment to saving these dogs that has driven the change. And we're seeing it around the nation -- not only in increasing shelter save rates, but in how their communities also view pit bull type dogs.

And this is a very good thing. 

Kansas City, Kansas was led by its own animal welfare organization. In 2014, Kansas City, KS passed a law allowing for the trap, neuter, release of community cats. Several local organizations stepped up to do the TNR work -- led by the Humane Society of Greater Kansas City, The Rescue Project, Spay & Neuter Kansas City, and others. The end result was a better relationship with the community they served, and their local government. The Kansas City Kansas Animal Shelter was also doing its part by working to save pit bulls that entered their shelter in spite of the ban. The increased average length of stay for pit bulls (71 days) and the added costs of valuing their lives was a driver in the decision to repeal the ban.

In these cases, it's been the leadership of the animal welfare community that has helped drive the change in their communities. Most people are not terribly familiar with animal welfare issues, so they look to the professionals in animal welfare to provide leadership. And when we do our jobs well, and lead our communities through both our words and actions, good things happen, policies get changed, and lives get saved. And that's something worth working for.