KC DOG BLOG

Heads up on Missouri SB 95 (Related to Proposition B)

Well, this was predictable.

Two months ago, the voters in the state of Missouri passed Proposition B that would have put several stipulations onto commercial dog breeders in the state -- including a couple of stipulations that I thought were troubling such as limiting the number of breeding dogs in the state to no more than 50 dogs, and demanding unfettered access to the outdoors.

While there are a couple of proposals in both the state House and Senate that would completely repeal Proposition B (which is completely within the power of the state legislature to do under Missouri state law), there is another bill on the table that -- while it has some potential to be good - in its current form would devastate the animal rescue community.

SB 95 -- proposed by Brian Munzlinger - essentially removes the "breeding dog" stipulation and applies the rules from Proposition B to any animal care facility in the state with more than 10 female dogs over 6 months of age. The bill, which Munzlinger is calling the "Puppy cruelty prevention act" extends the coverage of Prop B to ALL facilities housing dogs in the state.  Thus, if passed, SB 95 would essentially limit all animal facilities - breeding facilities, rescues, and shelters, in size so that no facility in the state could have more than 50 dogs over 6 months of age and all would have to supply unfettered access to the outdoors.

This type of proposal when a 'puppy mill' law has been passed to then apply it to shelters and rescues is not unprecedented at the state level and was done in Washington two years ago.

Now, the initial reaction from the animal welfare community is likely to be outrage. The new regulations would have a hugely negative impact on shelters and rescues across the state -- who don't currently have 'unfettered' access and it would be cost prohibitive for them to add it to their shelter. Also, many of the large shelters in the state -- the ones responsible for rehoming large numbers of dogs -- have well more than 50 dogs in their shelters.  This will be pretty devastating for these organizations, especially as the rescue community may be facing countless dogs coming to the shelter from commercial breeding operations that are being forced out of business (or downsizing) due to Prop B passing.

However, the bill is potentially not all bad.  Let's face it, there are quite a few animal shelters and even rescue groups in the state that could upgrade the care for the animals in their care (I particularly like the idea of mandating that shelters provide "proper veterinary care").  However, a couple of the stipulations that I think are most problematic for the commercial breeders, are also the most problematic when applied to rescue groups. 

I honestly don't think the state Legislature would do anything that would knowingly cripple animal welfare in the state although retaliation is very much a concern.  The rescue community, along with HSUS, circumvented the legislature with their citizens initiative without a lot of political clout in Jefferson City, and made no friends in the process.  I do think the proposing Senator is making a point with introducing it about a) how unfair the law largely pushed by the animal welfare community is on the breeding community and b) using it for leverage to get rid of some of the more problematic clauses in Prop B.

Wayne Pacelle (who now is apparently a licensed lobbyist in the state of Missouri,which seems odd for the CEO of a 501c3) and the rest of the HSUS crew are in Jefferson City are pushing for no compromises on Prop B. However, in the process, they may be setting rescues up for the law to impact them also...which would not be good. Meanwhile, I'm also curious why neither HSUS, nor legislative group Missouri Alliance for Animal Legislation, neither has alerted the animal welfare community of the proposed SB 95 and the potential consequences of passing the citizen's initiative without the political capital in Jefferson City to prevent this kind of  retaliation from happening.

It should also be noted that Munzlinger is the same Senator that proposed last Spring that the clause that exempted shelters and rescues from paying annual licensing fees be stricken so that now all rescues have to pay the same licensing fees as breeding operations -- so this isn't new territory for Munzlinger.

It's going to be an interesting session in Jefferson City.  It may also give an opportunity to see if HSUS and others are willing to sacrifice any of the provisions of Prop B in order to help insure better care of animals in our animal shelters as well -- without, hopefully, crippling the animal welfare community in the process.

One of the first public hearings on Prop B is tomorrow at Noon down at the Capitol... and just be aware that there are a lot of alternatives to the no compromise position on Prop B -- some of which are awful, and some of which have the potential to make things a lot better for all animals in the state.

You can read SB 95 in its entirety here.

Panic Policy Making - an academic study & current events

A couple of years ago, two Political Science professors from West Virginia University, Susan Hunter and Richard Brisbin Jr, wrote a paper entitled:  Panic Policy Making: Canine Breed Bans in Canada and the United States. 

I was excited to read the study, as I got a preview of some of the information when Ms. Hunter presented at the KC Dog Advocates Canine Legislation Conference back in 2006.

The paper discusses breed specific legislation, and how it is mostly a symbolic reaction to a crisis, shifts the injury away from the owner and onto the dogs. Also, they claim that breed bans occur in a relatively unusual political context.

"Unlike adoption of some palliatives for risks, breed bans appear in circumstances marked by great emotionalism and limited inquiry into the sources and probability of a risk and limited consideration of altternative policies. Especially the alternatives suggested by animal rights and animal welfare advocates appear to be ignored. Therefore, to address how dog breed bans have come about, this paper proposes a framework to explain panic policy making."

According to their paper, the authors propose that breed bans usually happen in a very limited time frame and without the normal intrustion of new information and without the accumulation of increasing conflict or negative feedback about the policy (which usually occurs over time, which is limited).

For the purpose of the paper, they define Panic Policy Making as:

"The speedy creation of new laws and regulatins or new duties for governmental and private institutions in a situation of sudden, unreasoning and excessive fear and anger."

In the paper, they note 5 different stages of the panic policy-making:

Recognition: Usually a Panic Policy involves a sudden event like a crisis or disaster (often involving a serious injury) that has drawn little attention from interest groups or experts. Sometimes this event happens as a quasi-natural occurance, such as a death from a dog attack or the poisoning of a source of water.  Or it can be a manufactured occurance such as a new danger created by new policy entrepreneurs who are new in office. Individuals will then take the event or intrustion as a cause for alarm because it signals severe, catastrophic or dreadful consequences.

Construction & Interpretation of the event = fear, anxiety and panic. Panic is a self-interested action determined by an emotion-laden calcution of probabilities.  This then follows with contagion - Although panic is an individualized reaction to an injurious event, if it is shared with others, it becomes contagion.  Contagion leads to an emotional assessment of alternatives as the public will often overestimate the rist of infrequent events and underestimate the frequency of common events. Thus, individuals will like alternatives shaped by an affective prediction of panic from the future dangers and anticipation of the worst possible future.

Rationalization - political leaders react to the anxiety and panic by rationalizing a public policy that can confine or eliminate that fear.  Often this comes after the media spreads the collective fear to a mass audience. This opens up the 'policy window' quite suddenly. Unlike other states of moral panic, where lobbying or changes in polical party opens the policy window, in the case of breed bans, they propose that the MEDIA opens the policy window. In these cases, the media can provide very vivid images and reactions, can amplify those reactions and reinforce these amplifications. They can then create an information cascade in which an event is repeated to the point where a rational follower will unconditionally imitate them without regard to information from other sources.

Choice - Panic policy making features limited participation, elite control and groupthink in the formulation of a response to the catastrophe -- often using heuristics and "common knowledge" instead of facts and limiting the scope of alternative policies.  Panic policymaking is thus at the extreme end of a continuum of the amount of alternatives used to formulate the new policy

The final piece is implementation -- because of the speed in processing the legislation, there is limited calculation, planning and assessment on how a new policy will actually be implemented, there is neglect in calculating the sunk costs.  Because the initial panic is cooled by the new policy, the panic eventually fades to where it was before (non-existent) and the media moves onto other issues.

The remainder of the Panic Policy paper then focuses demonstrating how panic policy making exists within the world of breed bans. They interviewed politicians and those involved in enacting breed bans throughout Canada and the United States and provided a lot of examples of how most of these cities passed bans quickly in reaction to an attack or "paranoia regarding certain breeds." One chart within the paper notes that over 40% of people who supported breed bans said they did because of media reports. Around 15% said because of community panic (often also caused by media reports), 13% "all of the above" -- so including media reports.  So media reporting is a major influencer in causing people to support breed bans.

The paper then goes into detailed case studies, including details in Ontario (where more than 40 experts and animal welfare organizations testified against the proposal but were all ignored), New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, the Kansas City metropolitan area (and I can personally vouge for the accuracy of their claims for KC and the media cascade was actually the impetous for the creation of this blog) and Wheeling, WV.

The paper is a really good read and overview of public policy decision-making -- and you can read the 51 page article in its entirety here.

Panic Policy-Making in its current form

I've been interested in the Panic Policy-making idea after I witnessed it in action in my own area - and was further confirmed when a former Denver City Council member referred to the passing of Denver's breed ban as occuring during "The Hysteria of the Moment".  Denver, of course, is still struggling with the enforcement of their breed ban.  

Ohio, the only state with any type of breed specific law, is talking about repealing their breed-specific law after their state legislature tacked the breed specific languange onto another bill back in 1987 just one day after the death of a man who was killed in a dog attack.

Meanwhile, the panic-policy-making continues.

Lincoln Park, MI is currently looking at a breed ban on 'pit bulls' following a fatal attack of a 5 year old boy involving 2 dogs -- neither of which resembled 'pit bull' type dogs.

In Waxhaw, NC, just a week after a girl was fatally attacked by two 'pit bulls', the community is considering new dog legislation. Despite the fact that the dogs' owner was recently released from jail, and had been talked to by police about allowing his dogs to roam at large, and despite the fact that the parents of the girl had been reported on "three or four occassions" as not supervising their child, and despite the fact that Waxhaw has no animal control department (in spite of a rapidly growing population, the city quickly jumped to possible new laws as a solution to the attack.

Often times, the very fact that some cities have placed bans on particular breeds of dogs is used as a reinforcement that such bans are either effective legislation or well-thought-out legislation. However, when you look the circumstances that led up to the passing of this legislation - and the often hurried approach to passing the legislation such as is panic policy making, it becomes very clear that these breed bans are most often the result of emotional, panic-driven decisions vs well-thought-out and well crafted laws.  It makes these laws take on a whole new meaning.

Meanwhile, when cities actually take the time to really study a solution, and listen to the experts in their community on the topic, they nearly always come out with a policy that focuses on reckless owners and on a dog's behavior, not breed.

If we are to make improvements to the way p0licy is handled in this country, we must put an end to the panic policy-making that rushes to quick decisions to put an end to civic panic - and instead, focuses on meeting with experts to explore all of the possibilities and effectiveness of ordinances that really do improve public safety. Knowledge and understanding how panic policy-making works is critical to ending the cycle.

Bill to repeal Ohio BSL reintroduced

Representative Barbara Sears (R - Lucas County) has reintroduced a bill that would repeal the breed-specific law in the state of Ohio.

Ohio is the only state in the US that specifically targets individual breeds of dogs (14 states actually prohibit such laws) and under Ohio state law all 'pit bulls' are automatically declared to be dangerous dogs.

Sears proposed the same law in 2010 as HB 79.  The law passed through the House of Representatives in a nearly unanimous vote as an amendment to HB 55 (an animal cruelty bill) but was never heard in the Senate. So, once again the bill is proposed, this time as HB 14.

Sears has worked her way up through the legislature and is now the Assistant Majority Floor Leader -- so she has a lot of clout in the House. However, the representatives in the state of Ohio need to hear from their constituents that HB 14 is LONG overdue and that the state's breed-specific laws need to be repealed.  So if you are a resident of the state of Ohio, contact your state Representative and voice your support for HB 14 as introduced.

One of the best places to keep up with HB 14 and what you can do to help is through the great folks over at the Ohio Coalition of Dog Advocates -- or via their facebook page.  

Your state (and likely your city) is broke - and why it matters to you

A couple of weeks ago, 60 Minutes ran a great segment on the state of the state when it comes to budgets.

And it's not pretty.

According to most economists, most states have major financial shortfalls. California is currently facing roughly a $19 billion budget deficit next year and has a credit rating approaching junk status.

Arizona actually sold off its state capitol, supreme court building and legislative chambers to private investors and now leases back the space for their government.

New Jersey faces a $10 billion deficit. Illinois currently has about $5 billion in outstanding bills it cannot pay and is already 6 months behind on payments -- affecting tens of thousands of people who are waiting to be paid by the state.

And the financial struggles aren't limited to those states. The budget deficits become even more troubling because many of the states are in danger of having to dramatically cut workers and to possibly fall short on pensions (which are generally owed to a whole host of former government workers--including teachers) and money that is committed to needy charitable organizations.  New Jersey has about $46 billion in unfunded pension liabilities and $66 billion in unfunded healthcare liability.

The state budget woes will also have a huge impact on cities -- who often rely on up to 1/3 of their revenues from the state (which will get squeezed) and many of the cities are already in the same budget crunches and are struggling to meet their obligations on municple bonds.

It's an interesting story, on a lot of fronts -- but what does that mean for the animal welfare community?

It means that cities and states are looking to save money -- in any and every place they can.  And that means that animal welfare programs will be cut -- because they, in general, won't (and probably shouldn't) be prioritized over things like education and social services. Which means state and local funding for things like animal shelters, animal control, USDA inspectors, funding for low cost spay/neuter programs, etc will likely all be on the chopping block. Already, the state of Pennsylvania has all but cut out funding for enforcing the state's 'puppy mill' laws.  Most states are already under-funded in these areas -- and it may get worse before it gets better.

And it's really important for people to understand this when they look at animal welfare, because it will force us to be smarter about what we ask for --and it may force cities to look at eliminating laws that are costly to enforce. So while it sounds bad, there are a lot of opportunities here. And here are some of my initial thoughts on what it could mean:

1) Openings for repeals of breed-specific laws - In September, the city of Topeka repealed their breed-specific laws as city officials determined that in doing so would save the city $30,000-$50,000 a year in enforcement, legal and kenneling costs -- and wouldn't have a negative impact on public safety. Best Friends has a lot of resources to help calculate the costs of breed-specific laws that can be helpful.

2) Protect against mandatory spay/neuter laws - MSN laws have proven to be ineffective in virtually all cases in which it has been implemented. The reason is that it drives up impounds because people who don't comply with the law often end up with their dogs confiscated, which drive up enforcement, shelter and euthanasia costs. When statewide MSN was proposed in California last year, the state department of finance concluded it would be very costly to enforce. Meanwhile, data from the state of New Hampshire indicates that for every $1 spent on targeted, voluntary, low-cost spay/neuter programs, it can save $3 in animal control costs.

3) No Kill success is not determined by financial investment -- having good, strong leadership is more important to no kill success than good funding.  So budget cuts do not mean shelter animals must die. In fact, we're starting to see a lot of cities turn over their shelter contracts to private entitites because these entities can often operate shelters at a cheaper cost to cities than the cities can operate them themselves. Additionally, private entities often are more focused on life-saving than publically run shelters that are often more focused on the 'animal control' functions of their jobs.

4) Commercial Breeding laws that work and are sustainable - -I've written a lot about Missouri's Prop B 'puppy mill' law in the past few months and how I think it's destined to fail, in large part because enforcement resources are already too limited and because it never addressed this core problem. Money for more enforcement is not going to just pop up out of nowhere. While the state government is currently looking at repealing Prop B, it also gives everyone (on both sides of the issue) to create a law that follows some of the Better Business Bureau recommendations that also helps provide funding for enforcement -- that can remain even if the rest of the budget for enforcement is cut.

I'm not saying it's all doom and gloom -- but I think a larger understanding of the situation can help animal welfare advocates push for responsible laws that have a chance of being implemented because they are fiscally responsible and at the same time be smart in what they ask for -- if we do that, it will be good for the animals in spite of the tough economic times.

h/t on the 60 Minutes article to Sam the Dog Trainer via Facebook

Prop B passes in Missouri with 51.6% of votes - and some thoughts

Yesterday, Proposition B - - a bill that would further regulate commercial dog breeding in the state - passed by a fairly narrow margin of 60,000 votes.

The map to the left shows a colored map of the state and how each county voted on the initiative.  The red counties all voted against Prop B -- the tan counties voted in favor.

For those who are halfway familiar with the geography of the state -- you'll notice instantly that the predominently urban areas (Kansas City/St. Louis) voted in favor of Prop B.  The more rural parts of the state voted against the proposition.  The lone exceptions are Dunklin and Pemiscott counties down in the bootheal and St. Francois county (south of St. Louis).

You can actually see a breakdown of voting on county by county basis with the interactive version of this map.  The voting differential by county is pretty amazing.

I think the map shows an interesting difference between the views on this topic based on rural vs urban lifestyle. 

A cynic might look at the difference and say that the people in rural areas don't share the same compassion toward animals as people in urban ones -- or that they just see them as 'livestock'. Others might note that these are areas where many of the state's commercial breeders reside, and they are protecting their financial well-being.

On the other side, it might be noted that rural america -- the part of the country that produces the food we all eat -- has become skeptical and outright contentious with the animal rights movement and suspicious of the end-goal of HSUS (who co-wrote Prop B and was a major funder in the campaign to get it passed) and many others within the animal rights movement -- and may be more in tune with their desired end goal than people who are further removed from our food sources.  This group also lives within areas with a lot of the commercial breeders and are likely more aware of where the problems are, and what would be more viable solutions.

The reality is probably that both sides are at least somewhat right.

I have some more thoughts on the 'puppy mill' issue that I'll discuss in a later post.

Dangerous Dog Laws that Work

In 2007, in the shadow of a tragic fatal dog attack (involving a young boy that was mauled by a female dog that was chained up in the family's basement with her litter of puppies) in Minneapolis, the city began looking at making changes that would improve public safety in the community.

Their law, which you can find in its entirety here (64:110), sets up two different criteria of dogs based on the bahavior of the dogs. "Potentially dangerous" dags are ones that, while unprovoked, inflict a minor injury on a person or domestic animal or a "known propensity, tendency or disposition to attack unprovoked". Danerous" animals are ones that inflict fairly substantial wounds.

The law also prohibits dogs that are declared dangerous (based on behavior) from being owned by violent folons.

I've discussed the ordinance before, but new numbers make talking about it worth repeating.

In 2005, Minneapolis has 481 total bites in the city.  In 2007, Minneapolis had 411 total bites. In 2008, the first full year with the ordinance, numbers dropped to 360 total bites.  In 2009 they had "just over 300". 

The number of "serious" (defined by the bite breaking the skin) dog bites dropped 19% in 2008 and another 35% in 2009 - from 140 "serious" bites in 2007, to 113 in 2008, and 74 in 2009.

It isn't uncommon after a significant dog attack for cities to re-look at their dangerous dog laws. All too often they seem to focus on "what other cities have done" vs what has actually been effective at solving the problem. There is also a tendency to do something knee jerk (like a breed ban) that is based on what they think the public wants vs doing the research necessary to figure out what will actually solve the problem.

Repeatedly, laws that target chronically irresponsible pet owners and define dangerous dogs based solely on the behavior of the dog have proven to be effective an minimizing dog bites in communities. We need to learn from these successes and promote similar legislation and enforcement techniques that actually WORK for the betterment of animals and the community.

Fallout from Oreo's Law teaches us that old habits die hard

This post isn't about Best Friends. Well, not really. I have no interest in piling onto an organization that I have a lot of respect for in a time when they are getting a lot of criticism. I'm a fan of Best Friends. I've been fortunate to speak at their conference. I've learned a lot from their resources. Russ Meade, Ledy Van Kavage and others with the organization have been very supportive of our organization at times when we've needed the help. I've enjoyed their TV show - and their helping of the Vick dogs has been a huge study in how environment, not breeding, or breed, have the most to say about a dog's personality.

And this isn't a post about Oreo's Law. A law that was pushed hard by No Kill Advocates across the country and in the state of New York. A law that was opposed by the ASPCA in New York and became very controversial -- and two weeks ago was tabled by the New York Legislature. 

This story isn't intended to draw lines -- although it might. But I think the two weeks that have followed the tabling of Oreo's Law, the following criticism of Best Friends' "Neutral" stance on the law, and Best Friends' response to the criticism are a perfect symbol of a couple of the problems I think are impeding progress toward us becoming a No Kill society.  And that is what I want this post to be about.

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For those who are uninitiated, Oreo's law was named after a a dog in New York City, Oreo, that was dropped off the roof of a 6 story building. The dog's owner was never convicted of a crime, but Oreo become the property of the ASPCA (who handles animal control in NYC). After rehabilitating Oreo's physical wounds, they determined that they would never be able to heal her emotional ones -- and declared her too unstable to ever be adopted out. So they put Oreo on death row. A New York rescue group, Pets Alive, offered to take Oreo to their sanctuary -- where they would spend the time needed to rehabilitate her -- or, if never completely rehabilitated, would be allowed to live out her life at the sanctuary where she would get plenty of interaction and play time.

The ASPCA declined, and Oreo was killed at the shelter.

Oreo's Law was designed after Hayden's Law in California. The law would provide open access to rescue groups to city run shelters. So 24 hours before an animal would be killed at the shelter, the shelter had to let the public know about the animal, and a licensed, 501c3 rescue group would be allowed to pull the animal and make them a part of the rescue instead of being killed.

Somewhat predictably, the ASPCA opposed the law -- I think the name alone, and the widely public dog that was the namesake, was enough to put them on the defensive and try to defeat the law.  Even with a name change, the impetus for the conversation was probably a deal breaker from the start for the ASPCA.  It probably also didn't help that one of the champions for the law, No Kill Movement leader Nathan Winograd, has had previous personal history with ASPCA leader Ed Sayers that made the proposal of the law (even though Winograd, himself, didn't propose the law - or name it) seem personal. I think the feeling that the law was personal was its downfall and created divisiveness on the issue -- more-so than the merit of the law itself.

Because of the opposition, the bill failed. And in the aftermath, it was Best Friends, an organization that declared themselves "neutral" in the bill, that drew the ire of the those who supported the bill. Because their support may or may not have made the difference in the passing of the law.

And while Best Friends has every right to either support, or not support a law all they want, it is their stated REASON that troubles me most -- because it it appears to be very backward for a forward thinking organization.

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Via Best Friends' Facebook page, Best Friends CEO Gregory Castle released his statement on why Best Friends did not support the bill -- along with their history with lobbying on the bill.  The entire statement is well worth the read -- so please go do so. 

Now, I'm going to state for the record here that I'm not an insider in this case. I've met Mr. Castle and find him to be a smart man and have no reason to believe he is being anything but honest in his statements (which I wouldn't say about everyone I've met in the Animal Welfare movement). So I'm going to take his reasoning at his word.

In the statement, Castle notes that he, and Best Friends, favor open access laws for shelters:

"One good thing that’s come out of finding ourselves in the middle of a shelter access debate is that it confirms what we have long espoused: broad shelter access is a basic element of No More Homeless Pets. Moving forward we intend to support shelter access bills in New York and elsewhere."

In this statement we find that Best Friends supports the basic premise of Oreo's law -- even though they did not support the actual law. So why?  According to their statement, it comes down to two basic things:

1) The ASPCA and the mayor's alliance didn't support the bill and Best Friends didn't support the personal hostility that existed on both sides of the equation.

2) The law was open to all 501c3s (unless anyone affiliated with the organization had ever been charged with animal cruelty) and Best Friends thought there should be a qualification threshold that would prevent some unsavory rescue organizations that are hoarders that mask themselves as rescues from participating.

And that's their statement. Their words. and I think both reasons show a shining example of what has been holding back the animal welfare movement in this country for decades.

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I'm a big fan of open access laws. It seems so basic. If one organization is "full" and doesn't have the resources to care for an animal any more, but another organization does, then surrendering that animal to the other organization just makes sense. While most shelters in the country work this way to some extent, there are still many municiple shelters that don't. And I've seen the dramatic difference it can make with my own eyes in Kansas City, Kansas.

Only 2 short years ago, the KCK animal shelter was one of the highest volume killers of animals in this metro. They didn't work with rescue groups and refused to do so. And animals died because of it - by the hundreds if not thousands..

A new shelter manager came in, allowed a local rescue group to pull all of the animals they wanted -- and within 6 months every healthy and treatable animal in the shelter was finding a home -- and it has been that way for over a year now. All of the animals weren't saved because the public instantly got more responsible, or because the city become more compassionate, or because the city created better laws. They got saved because one organization was given full access to the shelter to save lives.

If Kansas had an open access law that would have mandated this years ago, thousands of animals would have been saved from that shelter. And so the success that is happening today, could have happened if the shelter had just been open access before.

Open access laws are good to help rescue organizations deal with bad civic shelter directors and we could all probably name a few that fit the description..

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There is no doubt that there are some hoarding groups out there that mask themselves as "rescues". Every year, dozens of these groups are busted. Regardless of whether or not Oreo's law was passed, these groups will continue to operate in New York and elsewhere unless they are found, charged and prosecuted for animal cruelty. This should be done regardless of whether or not an open access law is passed. It makes no sense to me that we would not pass good legislation, that could potentially save thousands of animals' lives, because people are breaking laws in other areas. Enforce those too! But don't let a small minority of "rescues" that are doing it wrong prevent the passing of legislation that would help hundreds of other rescues do it right.

The whole overarching idea here is the same one that exists in dozens of other ole school ideas of sheltering. We have somehow determined that it is ok to kill animals to prevent the low-probability bad event from happening.  That even though MOST rescues are good, we must kill the animals to prevent the few bad rescues from getting them, instead of taking the steps to stop the bad rescues. And we mask the killing by using a term that indicates the end of suffering, euthanasia, even though the animals aren't suffering.

This same "kill them to save them" idea is why many pit bull rescue groups SUPPORT the decision of civic shelters to not adopt out 'pit bulls' because they cannot do the same type of screening the rescue groups can do. They say they favor the shelters killing the dogs to prevent them from being adopted by dog fighters -- even though even the ASPCA notes that most dogs used in dog fights are bred specifically for that purpose and are seldom if ever adopted from shelters. I'm not saying it doesn't ever happen. I'm not saying that we shouldn't use some basic percautions, but killing thousands of dogs in a shelter to prevent the rarest of occurances is a classic "kill em' to save 'em" idea.

It's this same idea that causes many rescues to deny almost as many potential adopters as they accept because they're seeking 'perfect' homes for dogs to avoid the possibility that something might go horribly wrong (even though and extreme few adoptions end up going horribly).

Best Friends knows this. They know that the kill 'em to save 'em attitude exists and have spent countless hours in conference lectures and in writing website copy trying to overcome this attitude. And yet they used the very idea to support why they didn't support a law they philosophically believe in. It doesn't make sense to me.

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They also said they didn't support the law because they didn't want to be seen as divisive in their support of the law because the ASPCA opposed it -- even though, again, philosophically, they admit that they agree that open access laws are an important part of the No More Homeless Pets (or No Kill) equation.

I want to say, I'm all for everyone being on the same page when it comes to creating new laws -- it is certainly helpful that way. But if recent history has told us anything, sometimes the national organizations need to be dragged along to new ways of thinking. It wasn't because of collaboration that HSUS began supporting TNR programs or deciding that all dogs from fight busts should NOT be immediately killed. Oh sure, EVENTUALLY they got there through collaboration, but only after loud public outcry.

At some point we cannot let the organizatoins with the money and the big names continue to dictate animal welfare policies (or in this case) hold back a progressive one.

At some point you have to just push for what is right -- regardless of who agrees with you. And while collaboration is always preferred, we can't wait around forever, forgoing solid policies while animals die in uncooperative shelters because one organization's feelings were hurt and doesn't want to go along with it.

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So where do we go from here?

My hope is that a new open access law will resurface next year in New York and elsewhere. I think the people with a common interest in this should sit down together and figure out what are the necessary precautions to put into place to protect the animals from bad situations. Dooming them to death in the shelter if there are viable options for them is worse than the animal cruelty so many are trying to avoid.

And I would like to think that all parties involved should be willing to work on this together. If it's all about the well-being of the animals, then everyone should be able to put their personal feelings aside and do what is in the best interest of the animals -- and create something everyone can agree on. I hope.

And as an animal welfare commuity, we need to learn from this too. We need to get rid of the mindset that we need to 'kill 'em to save 'em", and we need to realize that creating policies that lead to thousands of animals being killed to protect them from remote possibilities of future danger is not good policy. Don't be careless, but don't kill them to save them either.

And we need to drag those who support bad policies (or don't support good ones) with us. Regardless of their name, or their bank account, we should push these national organizations to move toward policies that help end the killing.  Or force them to step aside.

If we are a humane population, we will do just that. 

For more info:

Winograd - Where have you gone Best Friends?

Best Friends - Shelter Access - Moving Forward

Best Friends - BFAS Statement on Oreo's Law

Winograd - Best Friends "Spin" Machine Goes into overdrive

YesBiscuit! - Best Friends Animal Society and Oreo's Law

For your Entertainment - On Oreo's Law

Change.org - Can there be a future for Oreo's Law?

Puppy mills, HSUS, stopping HSUS, & the need for another side

This post may meander a bit. For that I appologize. But there is an interesting battle waging in Missouri politics that may dramatically shape the face of politics in this state, will dramatically decrease HSUS's state-wide lobbying power - -that will no doubt catch the attention of politicians elsewhere.

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Earlier this week, an organization called the "Missourians for the Protection of Dogs" submitted over 190,000 signatures for a ballot initiative that would put the "Puppy Mill Cruelty Prevention Act" on the state ballot in November.  The group needs approximately 100,000 legitimate signatures in order to get the initiative on the ballot.  Although the work of vetting all of the signatures is far from complete, it seems likely that they will have enough legitimate signatures to take this to a state-wide vote in November.

The Puppy Mill Cruelty Prevention Act is wrought with problems. Few of the items on the initiatve are not already state law. And even the new criteria aren't going to even make a dent in the problem.  Currently, the Humane Society of the United States (who is largely funding the Missourians for the Protection of dogs group -- to the tune of about $500,000 to this point) estimates that there are over 3,000 commercial dog breeders in Missouri -- of which, only 1525 are actually licensed. However, even though state law mandates that all licensed facilities are inspected each year, a 2008 audit of the State Department of Agriculture notes that in 2006, 40% of the LICENSED facilities weren't even inspected due to there being too few inspectors.

So currently, nearly 1/4 of the state's breeding operations aren't even inspected each year because they are either unlicensed, or because the state doesn't have enough inspectors to inspect even the ones that are licensed. The ballot initiative doesn't address funding, staffing or even kennel licensing -- which is right now the biggest issue keeping us from closing down more of our illegal and substandard operations.

Even worse, is the reality that the law's 50 breeding dog limit has easy loop-holes that cannot be easily undone as it will take a separate ballot initiative to change. This also doesn't include the reality that the 50 dog limit is more about counting dogs instead of how the animals are actually cared for (ie, I'm WAY more concerned about somone with 45 dogs that are abused and poorly treated than I am about the person with 55 dogs that are relatively well taken care of -- but numbers are easier to enforce so I know which one inspectors will spend more effort enforcing).  

And such limit laws always have unintended consequences. Just on Sunday, a story ran about the influx of animals that are flooding into Virginia shelters following a similar limit law that went into effect and breeders are being forced to drop off their 'over-the-limit" dogs to the shelters in order to comply with the limit law.

The law is a mess. But it seems destined to be taken to the ballot in November.  Maybe.

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The initiative has its share of opponents. The Missouri Vet Medical Association came out earlier this year with its opposition to the law.  As did the Missouri Better Business Bureau. Both stated that enforcement of current laws was a much bigger issue than the need for more laws. Both were ignored by those who gathered signatures for the ballot language.

The Missouri Federation of Animals Owners has even filed a lawsuit challenging the ballot language because it claims the term "puppy mill" -- used in the bill - is a prejudicial term that was used to gain support for the initiative. If the term is deemed prejudicial, it would be wiped off the ballot.

Given all of this - -as well as the state's ag lobby - it is no surprise that there is now an effort to block the initiative.

And thus we have HJR 86. HJR 86 is an initiative to place on the ballot a change to the state Constitution. The Amendment, if passed by the voters, would dramatically limit the power of animal rights lobbying groups to impose new legislation. Here's the language:

Upon voter approval, this constitutional amendment, in order to
protect Missouri's agricultural economy, affirms the right of
Missouri citizens to raise domestic animals in a humane manner
without the state imposing an undue economic burden on their
owners.  No law criminalizing or regulating crops or the welfare
of domesticated animals will be valid unless based upon generally
accepted scientific principles and enacted by the General
Assembly.  The resolution will not prohibit or limit the right of
a city or county to enact ordinances and will not invalidate a
state law that makes it a crime to grow a crop that has been
declared a controlled substance. (emphasis mine).

So in other words, the state wants HSUS (and others) to butt out, leave our agriculture industry up to the scientists and farmers, and not allow citizens petitions like the most recent puppy mill initiative.

I have mixed emotions on the HJR 86. In many ways, the idea of blocking citizens petitions flies in the face of a citizen-led democracy. But on the flip side, I've said for years that while representatives are elected by the majority, one of their major roles is to protect the minority from the majority. Citizens ballot initiatives are solely "majority rules" initiatives that can allow a majority to dominate a minority. The ballot language is problematic as "generally accepted scientific principles" is very vague.

On the flip side, if the constitutional amendment makes it on the ballot, and is passed, it will completely rule out the possibility of other poorly crafted citizen's petitions like the Puppy Mill Cruelty Prevention bill.  Which if that happens, HSUS will only have itself to blame for its history of poorly crafted legislation.  And no doubt, other states that are facing HSUS ballot initiatives are sure to take note of this and likely follow suit.

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Last week, Christie over at the Pet Connection wrote an interesting post: Which do you hate more: HSUS or Puppy mills?

It was a good piece written about some "puppy mill" legislation on the ballot in California. I won't even claim to know the specifics of their law.

But the takeaway from the article, for me at least, was the problem we've run ourselves into when it comes to potential puppy mill legislation in this country because the voices in the fight are on such polar ends of the spectrum. On one side, you have HSUS which continues to go after commercial breeders with the stated mission to end all breeding.

One the flip side, you have a lot of the large commercial breeders who want no regulation at all -- ignoring the reality that every business in existence is regulated.

And these are the two groups that are proposing the policy.

And in the middle of these two polar sides, are a lot of intelligent, caring, animal welfare people who want animals to be treated well but can still respect those who responsibly breed. Unfortunately, in many cases, we're torn between the two polar sides on which side to choose when neither really speaks for our views.

It seems increasingly clear to me that there is a huge need for "another" side. One that supports responsible legislation and enforcement that targets operators who neglect and cruelly treat their breeding animals, yet doesn't seek to end all breeding.  There just seems to be so much rational middle ground here, if only someone could seize it and be the voice for it.

 

H.B. 79 that would eliminate statewide BSL in Ohio is set for a hearing

From the Animal Law Coalition, HB 79 -- a bill that was introduced more than a year ago by Rep. Barbara Sears is now scheduled for a hearing in the Ohio Statehouse.

The bill would eliminate the clause in the state law that currently names all 'pit bulls' as potentially dangerous. While 14 US states have laws that PROHIBIT breed specific laws (and a few of those have found such legislation unconstitutional), Ohio remains the only state with state-wide breed restrictions.

The hearing is set for next Wednesday, April 14th at 9:30 and the Statehouse in Columbus -- Room 18. If you live in or around Ohio, you should try to attend and let them know that you support this bill as written.

If you can't attend in person, write to your state representative -- you can find yours sorted by zip code here.

It's way past time for the state of Ohio to get rid of this ridiculous law.  More info here at the Animal Law Coalition. 

What does a good dangerous dog law look like

Yesterday, I wrote a post about three cities with breed bans that are failing. Breed bans tend to fail because of the difficulties of them being enforced -- often due to problems with breed identification, the expense of dealing with lawsuits associated with unfair enforcement, and because the laws themselves are both under-inclusive and over-inclusive.

By under-inclusive I mean that breed bans only deal with a small percentage of the dogs that have aggressive behavior in a community because many of the dogs are of non-targeted breeds, and by over-inclusive I mean that the laws cover more dogs than are really problems because the majority of the dogs of whatever breeds are targeted are not aggressive and not problems. This wastes animal control resources by using them on non-problem dogs. Given that no city I've ever seen has money to burn on excess animal control officers, it end up being a waste of taxpayer money and of limited resources focusing on non-problem dogs.

So if Breed-specific laws aren't the answer -- what is?

The following recommendation assumes that cities already have the basic leash laws and cruelty/neglect laws and are doing a good job of enforcing those. Honestly, I believe that about 75% of all problems of dogs biting people who are not members of their own family could be solved just with good enforcement of these two basic laws.  Keep groups of random strays from wandering around and prevent animals from being cruelly abused. Those are the first two steps. If you are a city that is looking for a solution, and you don't have those two pieces right and aren't enforcing them, stop reading now and go take care of the basics. 

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Let me pause for a second here to talk about dangerous dog laws in general. I know that it is common for people to note that in the grand scheme of things, dogs are not a huge risk factor in neighborhoods. That's true. There are an estimated 75 million dogs in the US and 99% of them will not cause any more harm than a nip or a scrape in their entire lifetime.  And the threat of fatal dog attacks is statistically almost non-existent -- with only about 25 dog attack fatalities every year in the US. This makes dogs infinitely safer than most common household things like stairs, ladders, bathtubs, swimming pools and electricity.

But the number of owned dogs increasing in this country, and there is still a need for people to do just do basic training with their dog and some people who get dogs with the intent to do harm, there is still a risk of injury with dogs and there is enough cause for concern that basic steps should be taken to help prevent as many incidents from happening as possible. So having no laws isn't a viable answer either -- but the laws should account for the statistical reality that the VAST majority of dogs are not problems, and will not be problems in their lifetime.

But the best laws -- the ones that most easily and fairlyenforced and that make the best use of animal control resources -- are designed to target the very small pecentatge of dogs in a community that represent real problems -- and that these dogs come in a variety of shapes and breeds.

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Given the information above, it becomes very clear, very quickly, that the best laws focus all of your law-enforcement resources on the tiny percentage of dogs that are potential problems by focusing on the actual behavior of the dogs. If the dog shows aggressive behavior, focus resources on the dog. If it doesn't, don't waste animal control resources on it.

Seems pretty simple.

Several cities in our community have adopted variations on an ordinance that I think is quite good and should fit the needs of most communities. In this dangerous dog ordinance, there are two different designations for dogs:

Vicious -- the dog has aggressively bitten another person or animal. There is a room for interpretation on it from the authorities so that they note that all bites or attacks are created equal to a truly vicious attack. In truly vicious attacks, animals are usually euthanized, but in most of the bite incidences, the animal is declared vicious and the dog must then wear a muzzle, the dog owner must alter the dog, licensing, there are certain kenneling requirements and they must get additional insurance. I think most people find this to be fair because the dog isn't necessarily instantly put down for minor bites, but does get restrained.  However, the criticism of doing this alone is that it is only a reactive ordinance - enforced only after a bite has taken place. Thus, we have the second designation:

Potentially dangerous - This is a dog, that based on its behavior would cause a reasonable person to think that if the dog got loose, it would attack. This isn't barking, this is aggressive behavior. The point of this is, if you have a neighbor's dog that you think is pulling on it's chain all day, growling, lunging, etc and you walk up to it and it really snarls it teeth -- and you feel like if that dog got free from it's chain, you would get attacked, you can call animal control on the dog - they evaluate the dog, and if they too declare the dog potentially dangerous, they can require the same insurance requirements, licensing and kenneling requirements as a "vicious" dog.  There is a great appeals process built in to protect dog owners from a spiteful neighbor and there is also a clause that allows them to go through training classes, and after a year, if they've fixed the dog of its aggressive behavior, then the designation can be lifted. I like that we've now provided an incentive for the owner to do the right thing and train their dog. This portion provides the "proactive" portion of the ordinance so we don't have to "just wait" for a dog to bite.

I find that the law with these two designations has the right amount of inclusiveness. It's not over-inclusive -- because dogs that do not behave aggressively are not targeted, thus, their owners are left alone and animal control resources are not wasted on non-aggressive dogs.  And it's not under-inclusive, because any aggressive dog is captured in it, regardless of what the dog's breed is (it also avoids pesky breed identification issues).

For the life of me, I have no idea why so many cities would continue to insist on passing a broken ordinance like BSL, that is ineffective, unfair, impossible to enforce and wastes valuable animal control resources, when it is so easy to do a behavior-based ordinance that only focuses on problem dogs. It just makes so much sense...I have no idea why some cities are resitant to it.

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There is one other law that conceptually I like, although I'm not sure I've ever seen an example drafted that I love.  The laws are usually called "reckless owner laws" - -and I think are conceptually great. We all know that the aggressive behavior in dogs ties back to neglegence on the part of the owners -- and if we just take the dog away from that owner, if they are allowed to get another dog, then the problem is not solved.

The idea behind reckless owner laws are people who are found to violate animal control ordinances a set number of times (let's say 3) in a certain amount of time (let's say, 2 years), then they are not permitted to own any more pets for a set amount of time (Let's say, 5 years).

This makes a whole lot of sense. And I love the idea conceptually. I've looked through the animal control numbers for a LOT of cities, and it doesn't take much looking to notice that a lot of the same addresses come up over, and over, and over. Again, it's a small part of the population causing a huge part of the problem.

What I don't love is the set number of animal control violations -- because let's face it, not all animal control violations are equal. Someone letting their license elapse is not the same as having their dog roaming at large, which is not the same as having the dog bite someone or for animal cruelty.  If you do the set number of violations, someone who let all three of their dogs' licenses expire ends up being a wreckless owner, where someone who owns one dog, that gets out twice and bites someone each time may only have two violations and not be a reckless owner.

While this may be a little too complicated to work in a real-life scenerio, let me throw out an idea that I've never seen done, but I think makes sense.  Skewer me if you want. But I think that "reckless owner" laws should be done on a points-type system where, once someone gets 20 "points" in two years, they are no longer allowed to own pets for 5 years. Each type of violation gets a set number of points. Forgetting to license - 1 point. Dog roaming at large but not really causing a problem - 3 points. Dog roaming at large and acting aggressively - 10 points. Dog biting someone off the owner's property - 15 points. Major animal cruelty violation - 20 points.  And combination that gets you to 20 points ends your right to own pets.

I'm not saying the idea is perfect, or that the point values are necessarily right, but I at least like the idea of separating out major violations from very minor ones that aren't huge public safety risks. The goal here should be to improve public safety, not just punish a dog owner for their dog getting through an open gate.

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So that's it. Four easy steps of laws with proper enforcement:

1) Leash law

2) Cruelty/neglect law

3) Behavior-based dangerous dog law

4) A reckless owner law that hits owners who are habitually problem owners

This will solve the vast majority of all of our problems, and focus all of our limited animal control resources solely on animals and owners that have shown themselves to be a problem and spends no resources on animals (and owners) that are not problems. This all seems really simple to me and I have no idea why so many cities seem insistent on passing over inclusing and under-inclusive legislation. This isn't that hard....let's not make it more complicated than it needs to be.