May 21, 2007
Margaret,
Thanks for your comments. Feedback is always appreciated.
I continue to offer my support for mandatory spay and neutering.
Though I did glance at the links you included in your email, I have years and years of my own personal memories volunteering and working in animal shelters throughout the Bay Area, and I have seen the problem from the inside. I don't need any reports to tell me any different. Too many animals and not enough qualified homes. Period. I have personally euthanized way too many perfectly healthy and adoptable animals of all ages ranging from newborns to six month old puppies to the old and sick ONLY because their legally allotted time ran out and there were way too many more coming in the next day. I have seen other technicians euthanize healthy adoptable animals day after day, year after year. I have very vivid memories of barrels full of dead animals of all ages and types only because their time was up. I have personally seen where these animals come from because I have been an officer in the field picking up way too many stray dogs and cats day after day that never get claimed, and I have worked the front counters where people of all types surrender their own personal animals for way too many bizarre reasons. I have picked up owned animals in the field because the owners wouldn't take the time to come into the shelter to surrender them.
I whole heartedly support early spay and neutering. Shelters have been doing these surgeries for several years. The SOLE reason for the early spay and neutering prior to being adopted is to prevent the animals being adopted from shelters contributing to the problem of overpopulation. I will continue to support early spay and neutering because I would not want another six month old cute, cuddlely and wiggly puppy having to endure the pain and confusion of a needle being pushed into the vein in its front arm containing the "blue juice" by an overworked and overtaxed and under appreciated shelter worker instead of running around in its fenced in yard playing with the children in the family that adopted it the day before.
If somebody wants to breed their dog let them purchase a permit. I don't care if this is inconvenient or expensive for anybody. It is a hell of a lot less expensive and more time efficient than euthanizing thousands and thousands of animals over and over every single year. In many shelters there are employees whose sole duty is to euthanize animals, and they do these for eight hours straight at a time, most of the time spend covered in blood and feces. How many of these people that oppose this legislation have actually spent any of their precious time volunteering at a shelter and listening to all the people that come in all day long surrendering their animals, or try to hold still a large lab mix while a technician injects "blue juice" into its veins? I think even one day at a large municipal shelter would change the minds of people very quickly.
If you look at the list of groups that want this bill to pass they are the shelters and rescue groups that actually volunteer their time and their homes to help out as many animals as possible. Go to some of these sites and you will see over and over how many animals they could not help solely because there weren't enough foster homes or money to hold these animals until somebody was willing to adopt them. These are the people that see the problem every single day and want it to stop. These are the people that get off their asses and actually do something. I know every one of these rescue groups would love to no longer exist because all the animals in shelters were being adopted to wonderful homes and there were no extras. Too many people are willing to spend several hundred to over a thousand dollars for a precious purebred dog, yet they won't spend a minute of their time to go out of their way to help a dog that ends up in a shelter and homeless just because their owners were to lazy to close the gate.
The people that say that this bill will stop all mixed breeds and purebreds from future existence seem to also forget that the reason why law enforcement exists in the first place is because there will always be the people who ignore laws and decide to do their own thing. They will still be breeding their dogs intentionally or unintentionally whether they receive a citation or not. That is why law enforcement of all kinds exists.
Margaret, if you have any further comments or questions, please let me know. If you want to know what it feels like to euthanize a healthy adoptable puppy just because its time was up, I would be happy to explain the technique in excruciating details. I remember all their cute faces every single day, and I don't want to forget them so I can do my part to get this legislation passed.
Jackie Phillips
http://profiles.yahoo.com/thesocialpet
jophillips@aol.com
"Not all those who wander are lost."
Hi Jackie -
AB-1634 is supposed to reduce the number of animals killed in animal shelters.
To find out where the animals come from that end up in the shelters, there is a very well researched report at http://saveourstrays.com/sos/index.htm For this link, you want to open the .pdf file at the upper right of the page.
To find out what the bill actually says, go to
http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/pub/07-08/bill/asm/ab_1601-1650/ab_1634_cfa_20070409_132343_asm_comm.html
this link also has an analysis following the bill text.
AB-1634 was amended and the amended version was passed
http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/pub/07-08/bill/asm/ab_1601-1650/ab_1634_bill_20070417_amended_asm_v97.html
You will note that neither the original nor the amended versions of the bill actually deal with the cause of overcrowding at shelters.
http://saveourdogs.net/documents/CCIPosition.jpg
http://www.akc.org/pdfs/canine_legislation/CA_action_center/AKC_Talking_Points_041807.pdf
http://saveourdogs.net/workingdogs.html
Furthermore, spay/neuter at 4 months of age has profound effects on the physical and behavioral development of dogs and cats.
http://www.naiaonline.org/pdfs/LongTermHealthEffectsOfSpayNeuterInDogs.pdf
This is a really bad law for a number of reasons.
The current local ordinances in San Jose which deal with breeding dogs are as follows:
7.08.150 Private kennel.
A person who maintains within or adjoining his private residence three or more dogs over four months of age, or three or more cats over four months of age or more than a combined total of two dogs and cats, such animals to be for that person's recreational use or for exhibition in conformation shows, field or obedience trials and where the sale of offspring is not the primary function of the kennel. The maintenance of more than two male or cats used for breeding purposes for which compensation is received,or the parturition or rearing of more than two litters of dogs or cats in any one calendar year from the total number of females owned or maintained by that person on the premises shall a rebuttable presumption that such animals are owned or maintained for the purpose of commercial breeding and the owner and the premises shall be subject to the permit requirements of a commercial kennel.
Note that if you have one dog which has a litter, you then have enough un-altered dogs to meet the definition of private kennel unless you find homes for them before they are 4 months old. BUT, thay can't be seperated from their mothers before they are 2 months old.
7.08.705 No kennel within two hundred fifty feet of any residence.
Unless permitted by other provisions of this part, no license to operate any commercial or private kennel or animal shelter within two hundred fifty feet of any dwelling house, apartment, hotel or other building used for human habitation shall be issued or renewed.
I believe this works out to a lot size of more than 2 acres to meet the distance requirements.
7.08.700 Permit required.
No person shall conduct, operate or keep any pet shop, commercial kennel, private kennel, pet grooming parlor, animal menagerie, animal shelter or horse establishment without first obtaining an appropriate permit from the administrator. The annual permit fee for the above animal facilities shall be fixed by resolution of the city council.
These laws are already very restrictive. If the shelters are still over-populated mandatory spay/neuter isn't going to help. Irresponsible owners will ignore this law as well. I think it would make more sense to liscense people to own animals, the same way they are currently liscensed to drive cars. I don't disagree with the purpose of the law, I disagree that it will have the desired results.
Cheers - Margaret Reed
Don't pick lemons.
See all the new 2007 cars at Yahoo! Autos.
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