Michael Markarian: Animals & Politics

Unchained: Q&A with Paulette Dean

When I talk to leaders of animal shelters around the country, I’m surprised how many think they are not allowed to lobby for animal protection laws. Or, they are just so consumed with the daily operations of animal care and control in their communities, that they don’t have the time or resources to advocate for better public policies. But if we only address the symptoms of the problems when animals are in distress, we will never get to the root causes of those problems and prevent animals from ending up in distress in the first place.

 
Paulette Dean, director of the Danville Area Humane Society
in southern Virginia, began a campaign to address the problem
of dogs and cats kept on chains.

That’s why I was so inspired to hear the story of Paulette Dean, director of the Danville Area Humane Society in southern Virginia. Paulette saw the inhumane treatment of dogs (and even some cats) kept constantly on chains in her community, and she launched a proactive plan over more than a decade to address the problem through city ordinances and public education. Her years of work have paid off for companion animals and their owners in Danville, and I had a chance to speak with her about her approach so I could share some of her thinking with blog readers.

Michael Markarian: Can you tell us a little bit about Danville as a community? What are some of the challenges for animals and animal lovers there?

Paulette Dean: Danville, a city of about 48,000 on the North Carolina state line, is a city that is struggling to redefine itself after the loss of the textile and tobacco industries. It has the highest unemployment rate in the state, and also struggles with low education and high poverty rates.

Animals and animal issues have been low priorities in the past. The Danville Area Humane Society operates the city animal shelter, and receives about 5,500 dogs and cats each year, along with approximately 250 other companion animals and livestock. 

Perhaps because of the problems that come as a result of poverty, there is a severe pet overpopulation problem. Although the humane society has helped 17,000 dogs and cats get spayed or neutered since 1993, the numbers received at the shelter increase each year. 

We seem to have a higher incidence of animal neglect and abuse than surrounding areas, although that may be because we have two court-appointed humane investigators (a volunteer position in Virginia). The board president and I have functioned as investigators for many years, and we have a strong working relationship with the police department and animal control officers. We investigate and prosecute many cases each year, including starvation, hoarding, dogfighting, and varying degrees of neglect.

MM: How did you approach the chaining issue and what has led to your successes?

PD: As we investigated complaints of neglect, one thing became very apparent: 90 percent of the complaints received involve companion animals constantly kept on chains. In this matter, we were “fortunate” to have a gallery of hundreds of pictures that were taken of dogs on chains. 

Seventeen years ago when I began full-time employment with the Danville Area Humane Society, we received a call from a man who said he had heard a dog whining in the woods behind his house, but he had not heard the dog whine for a couple of days. The animal control officer went to the address, and found the body of a dog in the woods. The dog had once been chained and evidently broke lose somehow, but still dragged the chain. The chain became entangled in bushes, and the dog starved to death. The animal control officer told me then that I should work to get all dogs off chains.

In 1996, parts of Danville were flooded as a result of Hurricane Fran. Then-Governor George Allen toured the area, and saw the bodies of two dogs who had drowned as they were chained to their doghouses. He had his driver stop and he knocked on the door to tell the woman he wanted the bodies buried. He even stopped by later that day to make sure that had been done.

The task of getting animals off chains seemed pretty overwhelming at that time. However, through the years that thought never left my mind whenever we received a dog with an embedded chain in his neck (many, many times each year) or when I saw for myself the chained dogs in backyards with no shelter, food, or water. I knew something had to be done.

Most dogs we held for rabies quarantine after biting someone or attacking another animal were dogs who were kept on chains. Make no mistake—the problem was not just having dogs constantly chained. We also investigated a few horrific cases of cats kept on chains. We knew that any effort to get dogs off chains had to include all companion animals.

With the support of the board (after all, the board president also functions as a humane investigator; he was with me for the vast majority of the cruelty cases), we held a summit meeting of sorts about three years ago. We invited veterinarians, dog trainers, representatives of the kennel club, and others we thought would be interested to define the problems animals face. We showed pictures of a few of our abuse and cruelty cases. From that meeting, we had the support of most of the people who worked with animals; we all agreed the overpopulation problem and the plight of chained dogs topped the list of problems faced by animals.

Our anti-chaining campaign was announced, with no plan of what we could do about it. The newspaper did an editorial about how we may be sincere, but we had not convinced the public. That we took as a challenge and a lesson. We met with the editors of the paper (very nice people who supported our work), and showed them pictures of our cases. We began to issue more news releases of our court cases. We purchased ads in the paper about the loneliness of chained dogs, and wrote articles for our newsletter.

I met separately with each of the nine city council members and shared the pictures and stories with them. We proposed that an ordinance be enacted to prohibit the chaining of dogs on unoccupied property. At the city council, we testified about how people chained large numbers of pit bulls in the yards of empty homes. That ordinance passed easily for, as one council member said, “It is a no-brainer.”

The anti-chaining campaign worked to address the problem
through public education and city ordinances.

MM: How did you continue your campaign after that first ordinance passed?

PD: Nothing happened for a couple of years, and then this summer, we decided we needed to reenergize the campaign. We issued a news release, inviting members of the public to come to a meeting about our anti-chaining campaign. We had a very nice turnout for that meeting.

We told the attendees that the best thing they could do would be to call city council members, and encourage their family and friends to do so. We told them we would notify them when it was time to begin making the contacts.

The board of directors of the Danville Area Humane Society voted to commit $10,000 to help build fences for dogs to get them off chains, with the requirement that we also be allowed to spay or neuter the animals, at our expense, for whom we build fences. 

A city council member happened to visit the shelter as we were bringing in a dog we had just seized. He saw the embedded collar and the thin body condition, and asked the city manager to please put a proposed ordinance on the agenda for a work session of city council.

We prepared a PowerPoint presentation, and went to the work session. We asked for a three-hour limit in a 24-hour period, and told about our $10,000 commitment. We talked about how this would help decrease the number of unwanted births. With the media there, we showed the pictures and told the stories. We also asked for delayed enforcement to give people time to make other arrangements for their chained animals.

Council members decided to advance the proposed ordinance, but they scheduled two public hearings. We posted the dates on our website, so no one could accuse us of hiding the truth from them. The editor of the newspaper wrote a very strong editorial in support of the ordinance.

As soon as the proposed ordinance was put on the agenda, we sent out an email alert to the supporters. Council members later said that it was apparent that the community was in overwhelming support. The newspaper allows anonymous online comments, so we asked people to respond to any negative comment. 

We had about 45 supporters show up for the two public hearings. For the first one, we had asked strong speakers to speak up. I gave a brief overview of my experiences with chained animals. I reminded them that I had personally taken the horrible pictures that they had seen, and the pictures were taken in Danville, Virginia. A veterinarian, an attorney who had helped us with our civil custody cases and other supporters told stories and gave facts. We thought it would be helpful to have a teenager speak. The president of a local high school club agreed to speak. Tragically, her father was killed three days before the public hearing. I sent an urgent email to our list, asking them to help us find another young person who could speak. One young woman stepped forward. She was terrified, and spoke softly, but she begged the city council to make Danville a better place to live—for the humans and for the animals. She held them spellbound by her courage and her conviction.

A couple of days before the second public hearing, someone wrote a letter to the city council, bringing up the point that people who live in the historic district are not allowed to have chain link fences for their dogs. A motion was made to table the ordinance until that issue could be resolved. Immediately after that meeting, a small group attended the work session. Council members resolved that concern, and an amended ordinance was submitted. Actually, the amendments strengthened the ordinance.

However, we sent yet another email alert, urging supporters to not give up the battle. I heard from a few council members who said they had received only two negative comments, but had been inundated with positive comments.

A week and a half later, the proposed ordinance passed. One council member could not attend, but he asked the mayor to give his regrets and assure the public that if he had been there, his vote would have been “yes.” When the mayor announced that and said the vote was unanimous, we gave the council a standing ovation. It was apparent to everyone that it was an ordinance whose time had come.

MM: In the big picture what do you hope to accomplish for animals in Danville and how does the newly passed chaining ordinance fit into that plan?

PD: We want to improve the lives of animals in this area. It’s that simple. The newly passed ordinance will do that for hundreds of dogs.

However, the ordinance has also had an unexpected result. About 10 years ago, we strengthened our adoption guidelines. We knew that it would be a controversial move since we have a high euthanasia rate, but we also knew it was the right thing to do. We were laying a foundation for the future. Adopted dogs cannot roam and be chained, and adopted cats must be kept inside. Since this ordinance has passed, we have heard from many people who know that we have the animals’ best interest in mind for all our decisions.

We choose our battles wisely. We realize that we make many heavy-duty decisions for the animals every day, and we strive to make sure they are the right decisions. This ordinance has helped us make new friends, and marshal our forces, so to speak.

MM: Most shelter directors are exceedingly busy just doing their jobs at the shelter, and I’m sure you’re no exception. Why do you think it’s important for shelter directors to take the time to get involved in legislation in addition to the day-to-day shelter work?

PD: Shelter directors must get involved in all aspects of animal welfare in order to successfully help the animals. Without proactive work, the daily work of a shelter just puts a bandage on the problems. The only animals helped would be the animals in the shelter. I used to say that once an animal comes to our shelter, their problems should be over, and that is a vital goal. However, as I became a humane investigator, it became painfully clear to me that hundreds of animals never received at a shelter were in dire need of intervention.

As we seize animals who have been starved or neglected or even tortured, and as we rescue animals who have been abandoned or have fallen into storm drains or have been hit by cars, I breathe a sigh of relief for that animal. However, I immediately begin thinking of all the animals who need our help and cannot get it because we do not know about them.

MM: Do you have tips specifically for shelter directors on how they can be successful with local legislation in their own communities?

PD: Shelter directors need to use the resources they have available—and the main power they have comes from the stories of the animals received at the shelter. Tell the stories, and show the pictures. Speak politely to local legislators. Find ways to include supporters, and help them feel that they can affect change.

MM: You’ve said that if you can do it in Danville, you can do it anywhere. What’s the secret to passing progressive, animal-friendly legislation in a community that has a more traditional animal use background?

PD: Be consistent and be patient. However, the best way to help animals is to choose a path and walk down that path diligently. Sometimes, I grow so weary of having the same conversation hundreds of times with people who claim they love their starving dog with the embedded collar or with the person who wants to make some money by selling pit bull puppies, but only “to good people who won’t fight them.” 

Anyone who works in animal welfare needs to keep one thing in mind. This is the same thing I told our volunteers as we worked on this campaign: If this ordinance passes, our individual lives will be the same. If the ordinance does not pass, our individual lives will be the same. We’re working for the animals. When people realize they are working for a cause that is greater than they are, miracles can happen.

Talking Turkey

It’s Thanksgiving week, and millions of American families are talking turkey as they prepare for their holiday meals. But they probably haven’t thought much about how 250 million American turkeys get from farm to table each year (at least not since Sarah Palin’s photo op last Thanksgiving of a turkey being slaughtered on camera).

A federal appeals court, however, has been contemplating the issue, and last week issued a ruling that affects not only hundreds of millions of turkeys but also nine billion chickens slaughtered for food each year. These birds are typically shackled and hung upside down, paralyzed by electrified water, and dragged over mechanical throat-cutting blades—all while conscious. Many birds each year miss the blades and drown in tanks of scalding water.

Currently, billions of chickens and turkeys do not have the
basic protection of being rendered insensible to pain prior to
shackling and slaughter.

It’s all because the U.S. Department of Agriculture currently exempts birds from the Humane Methods of Slaughter Act, the milestone federal law requiring that farm animals be rendered insensible to pain before they’re shackled and cut. Although Congress mandated humane slaughter for all “livestock” in 1958, the USDA’s interpretation of this half-century old law provides no protection for 99 percent of all food animals.

The Humane Society of the United States had joined forces with two poultry slaughterhouse worker advocacy groups and several consumers to challenge USDA’s exclusion of poultry from the protections afforded by the humane slaughter law. Slaughtering conscious birds is not only inhumane, but also presents serious risks for food safety and slaughterhouse workers who handle the flailing animals.

A federal district court ruled last year that USDA properly excluded chickens, ducks, and other farm-raised birds from the law. The court found the term “livestock” itself to be broad enough to encompass poultry, but nevertheless held that a muddled legislative record from 1958 showed Congress’ intent to exclude poultry. This despite one member of the House reading into the official congressional record a 1958 dictionary definition making clear poultry are indeed livestock.

The U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals overturned this decision last week, but without reaching the merits of the case. The court noted that, when the law was enacted, USDA itself considered “chicken eggs, commercial broilers, chickens, and turkeys” as “livestock and livestock products.” The court also observed that “congressional debate revealed views favoring both interpretations advanced here—one that would include chickens, turkeys and other domestic fowl within its expanse and one that would preclude such inclusiveness.”

However, the court declined to express any opinion on this critical legal question, finding instead that the courts have no jurisdiction to decide on this issue at all. According to the court, because even a favorable ruling would require additional, voluntary action by USDA to enforce the act, the plaintiffs cannot sue to plug this gaping loophole in the nation’s humane slaughter laws.

The court questioned “why Congress had not done something ‘clear and definitive’” to address this loophole, and also observed that Congress has already given the Secretary of Agriculture a “grant of authority…to include whatever additional ‘species of livestock’ he or she ‘consider[s] appropriate’ within the scope of the humane slaughter requirements.”

In fact, Congress has not only given USDA the authority to act, but has also asked the agency to examine this very issue: In the omnibus spending bill for fiscal year 2008, Senators Herb Kohl (D-Wisc.), Robert Byrd (D-W.Va.), Robert Bennett (R-Utah), Thad Cochran (R-Miss.), and Wayne Allard (R-Colo.) directed the USDA to study “controlled atmosphere stunning,” a method that, when done using a proper mix of gases, provides a more humane death by rendering birds unconscious before they’re shackled, let alone cut. It can also yield higher productivity for slaughter plants, such as fewer broken bones in the meat as animals aren’t struggling, and fewer workplace injuries for the staff.

By overturning the lower court decision endorsing USDA’s exclusion of poultry, the court has cleared the way for USDA and Congress to finally do “something clear and definitive” to ensure that billions of chickens and turkeys have the basic protection of being rendered insensible to pain prior to shackling and slaughter. It’s now time for Congress and USDA to act—and to finally give birds a more merciful end in the years and Thanksgivings ahead.

There Oughta Be a Law: Q&A with Cheryl Woodcock

I hosted a nationwide conference call with thousands of animal advocates this weekend to announce the winner of the Humane Society Legislative Fund’s first-ever “There Oughta Be a Law” contest. Animal rescuer Cheryl Woodcock of Baldwin, N.D., joined the call, and I gave her the news that her proposal was selected by our panel of judges—Reps. John Campbell (R-Calif.) and Jim Moran (D-Va.) and myself—out of more than 3,500 other entries from all 50 states.

The winner of HSLF’s 2009 “There Oughta Be a Law” contest,
Cheryl Woodcock, with her four foster kittens who were
found in a Dumpster.

Cheryl’s winning idea: a tax credit for spaying and neutering pets. It’s a timely and innovative proposal that incentivizes personal responsibility and encourages pet owners to do their part to help reduce pet overpopulation. “Cheryl’s Law” could become part of the solution toward ending the euthanasia of three million healthy and treatable dogs and cats each year in America’s animal shelters, and reducing the financial burden of animal care and control on local communities.

HSLF will bring Cheryl to Washington, D.C. to lobby for her bill. I had a chance to visit with her and want to share with blog readers a bit about her work and her winning entry.

Michael Markarian: Tell us about yourself and your animals.

Cheryl Woodcock: I am married with six kids. We live on 80 acres. We raise sheep, and Chesapeake Bay retrievers. We have three Scottie dogs, many farm cats, and a sheep herding dog, all of whom are spayed or neutered. Many of our cats and our sheep herding dog are rescues from the city pound. We have even rescued a few house birds. We also have horses, chickens, and calves. Currently, I work for two vet clinics and make homemade dog treats that I sell at some pet stores and at craft shows. Animals are my passion.

MM: What’s it like being an animal advocate and rescuer in rural North Dakota?

CW: Baldwin is a town of 736 people—a mostly rural population—although we have 18 families who live right in the town of Baldwin. We have a post office and a GREAT school. The school has grades K-8 with 15 students, two teachers, and a teacher’s aide. We fight a battle with the state legislature every two years—they try to close small rural schools and we fight to keep our schools open.

A few years ago, I was asked to help our local pound by raising an orphaned kitten. He needed to be bottle-fed. I took him home and he has been with me since. Right now, I have four kittens who were about two days old when they were tossed in a Dumpster at a gas station. A worker at the gas station found them and called the police. The police took them to the pound and I got a call from one of the animal wardens. I stopped at a store, bought formula and a bottle, and went to see my new friends. They were very frail and very, very cold. I really didn’t expect to see them all make it through the night. I had to feed them every two hours, day and night, for the first few weeks. My female Scottie dog, Maggie, helped care for them, by cleaning them for me. Luckily I was able to take them to work with me—I work for two vet clinics. They are growing and they just FINALLY started eating on their own. I will be looking for good homes for them in a week or so.

I am the person in the neighborhood who gets a call and takes the sickly animals from neighbors. I have gotten two sickly lambs and a calf and they have survived—for me. I love the challenge and the satisfaction of caring for them and watching them grow and flourish. I have even had baby lambs in my house when they were sick and too young to be outside. One lamb even walked around my house in a doggie diaper. I try to find homes for as many cats and dogs as I can. The city pound has a volunteer who is great at finding homes or rescue groups for the dogs who need homes. I am all about animals. I love animals.

MM: You have a pet treat business as well?

CW: Yes, the name is Farmer Tillie’s Homemade Dog Treats. I wanted to make quality wholesome dog treats for my Scottie dogs. I sell them in a few pet stores and at some craft shows. My dogs totally enjoy it when I make treats. They get to sample them. I have many satisfied returning customers.

MM: How did you hear about HSLF’s “There Oughta Be a Law” contest, and what made you enter?

CW: I was on Facebook one night, when I was up feeding kittens, and saw the ad for the contest. I thought I should enter. I was mad at what the abandoned kittens had to go through. I decided to enter because of the kittens and all the animals I see at the pound who look so lost and need homes. I hate it when animals have to be put down when there are no homes for them. It’s a better solution than them starving or freezing to death, but if there was an incentive for people to get their animals spayed or neutered, maybe this issue could become a thing of the past.

MM: Why is spaying and neutering dogs and cats so important to you, and how can a tax credit help?

CW: The reason I am so passionate about this issue is because of the tiny baby kittens I have taken care of. There are always abandoned animals at the city pound. Those who don’t get adopted or rescued get put to sleep. I hate seeing that as much as I hate seeing abandoned baby animals. I think if there was a tax credit for people to spay or neuter their animals, more of them would get spayed or neutered and there wouldn’t be so many abandoned animals. I think, in this day and age, with everyone looking for a way to save money, a tax credit would really make them think about it.

MM: Are you looking forward to your trip to Washington?

CW: I am TOTALLY excited about winning a trip to Washington, D.C. I have never been to that part of the U.S. I think it will be great to be able to see the White House, the Lincoln Memorial, and the Vietnam Memorial Wall. It’s all so much a part of our history.

MM: Who are your federal legislators in Congress?

CW: Senators Kent Conrad and Byron Dorgan, and Representative Earl Pomeroy. I would love to work with them in getting a bill passed!

Reckless Killing of Yellowstone’s Celebrated Wolves

When the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service this year removed wolves from the protections of the Endangered Species Act, it paved the way for the same reckless sport hunting and persecution that put these animals on the endangered species list in the first place. And now we’ve learned that the first sport hunting season on wolves to occur in the lower 48 states since the 1980s has claimed the lives of some of Yellowstone National Park’s most celebrated wolves and has shattered years of critical research by wolf biologists.

The de-listing of wolves has claimed the lives of
Yellowstone’s most celebrated wolves.

Just weeks after Montana’s wolf hunt began, about half the members of Yellowstone’s famed Cottonwood wolf pack—including two radio-collared females known as Wolf 527 and her daughter, Wolf 716—were killed by hunters outside the park. Yellowstone’s wolves are famous to the world thanks to television documentaries on National Geographic, PBS, and the BBC. As one of the very few unexploited wolf populations in North America, their behavior, life history, travels, and genealogy have been carefully studied by scientists since wolves were reintroduced to Yellowstone in 1995.

But not anymore. Kim Murphy reported in the Los Angeles Times on the impact the wolf hunt has had on scientific research:

“Whether the pack exists anymore or not, to us the pack is gone,” said Doug Smith, the biologist in charge of the Yellowstone reintroduction program that helped bring wolves back from the brink of extinction in the Northern Rockies. Cottonwood “was a key pack on the northern range,” he said, giving researchers a window into the existence of animals that had little or no interaction with humans.

We knew the de-listing of wolves would have tragic consequences. But even Montana state officials were shocked by the ease with which wolves were gunned down by hunters, and they suspended the hunt along a section of Montana’s backcountry near the northern border of Yellowstone.

Wolf hunting advocates in Montana and Idaho argued that the hunts were needed to control predation on livestock, and they trotted out their usual bromides about scientific wildlife management. But what they’ve done instead is roll back years of science, and target wolves who weren’t any threat to livestock at all—wolves who were feeding on elk and were part of Yellowstone’s natural ecosystem. In fact, Montana’s wolf hunting season overlapped with its elk season, and it seems the Cottonwood wolves were attracted to the gut piles left by elk hunters just outside the park’s borders.

More than anything, it demonstrates that the decision to take wolves off the endangered species list was unscientific and premature. Federal courts have rejected the government’s de-listing proposals six times, but it wasn’t enough to save Wolf 527 or Wolf 716. While it’s open season in Montana and Idaho, a lawsuit by The Humane Society of the United States has provided a stay of execution for wolves in Michigan, Minnesota, and Wisconsin.

Many environmentalists and animal advocates around the country voted for President Obama because they just couldn’t stomach Sarah Palin’s retrograde policies on wolves—now they’ve been saddened and let down by the Administration’s de-listing decision. It’s time to call off the wolf killing before it sets wolf conservation back any further and destroys more of their close-knit families.

A Loss for Alaska’s Wild

In Alaska, some people use airplanes to shoot wolves. But Dr. Gordon Haber used airplanes to help wolves and study the species.

Dr. Gordon Haber was an important voice for wolves in
Alaska.

I was heartbroken to learn that Dr. Haber died last week in a plane crash in a remote area of Denali National Park, after embarking on a single-engine flight over the northern end of the park to monitor his beloved Toklat pack. The pilot, Dan McGregor, suffered severe burns but survived. 

Dr. Haber had been studying Denali’s wolf packs for more than four decades, and had been a critically important voice for wolves in Alaska where the state professional wildlife biologists were aligned in an unholy way with the hunting lobby. He brought knowledge and understanding about one of the world’s most misunderstood and wrongly persecuted predators. He was particularly critical of Alaska’s state policies of mismanaging wolves, through trapping and airborne hunting, to artificially boost populations of moose and caribou for trophy hunters.

My colleague John Balzar interviewed the renowned wolf biologist in 1994 for a Los Angeles Times story on Alaska’s wolf killing program, and here’s what Dr. Haber said at the time:

We are shredding their social structure—the very thing that makes them wolves. We’re not talking about just having four-legged canines survive out there, but wolves. And what makes them wolves is their very sophisticated social structure. That’s what sets this species apart.

Wildness and wild animals have lost a true champion. We can honor Dr. Haber’s memory by fighting for the protection of wolves everywhere—from Alaska, where the state continues to wage its war on wolves, to the halls of Congress, which must pass the Protect America’s Wildlife (PAW) Act to stop the unnecessary and unscientific aerial gunning of these creatures.

It’s Animal Cruelty, Not Animal Planet

I had the privilege of sitting in the U.S. Supreme Court this morning as the nine justices debated whether to uphold the federal Depiction of Animal Cruelty Law, which Congress passed in 1999 to bar the commercial trafficking in videos of illegal animal torture for profit. The justices asked thoughtful questions about the balance between freedom of speech and the governmental interest in stamping out deplorable cruelty to animals. Principal Deputy Solicitor General Neal Katyal did an outstanding job defending the anti-cruelty statute and making the government’s case that the measure is narrowly constructed to stop inhumane and illegal conduct, not expression.

Today, the U.S. Supreme Court considered a landmark case
regarding the commercial sale of videos showing
illegal acts of animal torture.

But the most interesting turn of events came later on the high court steps, where proponents and opponents of the law gathered to offer their comments to reporters. For some time leading up to the hearing, the man convicted under the law for peddling several dogfighting videos, Bob Stevens, has been described by the press and by his own attorneys as a documentary filmmaker, someone who is not involved in dogfighting but is rather just a journalist seeking to inform others about the issue—as if he doesn’t represent the dark underworld of dogfighting, but rather represents Animal Planet or National Geographic. This despite the fact that Stevens says at the beginning of one of his own videos, “Japan Pit Fights,” that he flew his own dogs to Japan to participate in staged combat.

When Stevens’ attorney, Robert Corn-Revere, was questioned after today’s hearing about whether the man was in fact a reporter or a dogfighter, here’s what he had to say:

Mr. Stevens is not a dogfighter, he is not a dogfight promoter, he is a pit bull enthusiast. And yes, he has dogs who have been involved in fights.

So he fights his dogs, but he’s not a dogfighter? It sounds like his own version of what the definition of “is” is.

The fact is the law includes a broad exemption for depictions with any “serious religious, political, scientific, educational, journalistic, historical, or artistic value”—it’s just that selling videos of animals being maimed and tortured to people who are titillated by the violence and the bloodletting doesn’t qualify. We’ve already seen a huge resurgence in “crush videos”—where scantily clad women crush mice, kittens, and other small animals to death with their bare feet or high heels—readily available for sale again over the Internet due to Stevens’ constitutional challenge. If this important anti-cruelty law is not upheld, we can be sure that dogfighters like Stevens, too, will retreat from their dark corner and cause more and more animals to suffer for their snuff films.

Court Upholds Law Protecting People and Pets

While the U.S. Supreme Court tomorrow will consider a landmark case on the commercial sale of videos showing illegal acts of animal torture, another decision just issued by a federal court in Louisville could also have a meaningful impact on animal protection policies nationwide. The court upheld as constitutional nearly every component of Louisville’s comprehensive animal care and control ordinance, which protects pets and their owners in the metro area.

 
A federal court upheld Louisville's comprehensive animal
care and control ordinance.

The controversy began in November 2005, with two fatal attacks by pit bulls in Louisville, and city lawmakers reacted by proposing a pit bull ban. The city’s animal control ordinance was set to expire anyway, resulting from the merger of the Louisville and Jefferson County governments, so lawmakers decided to take the opportunity to address more wide-ranging problems, such as Louisville’s overpopulation of stray dogs and cats.

HSUS and other groups that oppose breed-specific legislation argued that a ban on pit bulls would be ineffective at addressing dangerous dog problems, and that other factors, such as the level of training and socialization provided by the dog’s owner, have a greater impact on aggressive behavior. To their great credit, lawmakers opted to pursue a measure that was not breed-specific but instead placed primary responsibility for a dog’s behavior on owners, and encouraged owners to consider spaying and neutering their dogs in order to decrease the likelihood of biting and aggression. 

The new law passed in 2007 not only took a proactive approach to dangerous dogs, but also strengthened other areas of the law—protecting dogs from continuous tethering, imposing certain requirements on dog owners and kennels to provide basic necessities to their dogs, disclosing information to consumers who purchase animals, and incentivizing the spaying and neutering of pets through differential licensing fees. Given that Louisville’s shelter euthanasia rate was three times the national average, something had to be done to address particularly acute and escalating animal control problems.

In their zeal to prevent any restrictions on animal use, however, the Louisville Kennel Club, local hunting organizations, and other plaintiffs filed a broad and haphazard lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of nearly two-dozen provisions of the law, including both newly enacted provisions and provisions that have existed in the Louisville animal control ordinance for years. The Kennel Club sought to invalidate the entire ordinance, which would have deprived the Louisville metro government of its ability to provide critical public safety protections for its citizens, divest the county’s animal control department of virtually every one of its functions, decriminalize acts of cruelty to animals, and put the county back on track toward becoming one of the most prolific dog and cat killing jurisdictions in the nation.

On Friday, the federal district court resoundingly rejected the Kennel Club’s challenge to the law. The court did not strike any of the language of the ordinance, and enjoined implementation of only one aspect of the law in a very narrow class of cases—the forfeiture of animals where a court has determined that there is probable cause that a violation of the law has occurred, but the owner is not able to pay a bond to cover the costs of care for the animal pending trial, and the owner is eventually acquitted of the offense. The court did not strike the bond requirement, nor the provision requiring forfeiture of animals to the metro government in certain cases after an owner is found to be in violation of the animal control ordinance.

The Kennel Club’s effort to invalidate key provisions of the ordinance was rejected over and over again in the court’s opinion. Important sections of the animal control law challenged by the Kennel Club and upheld by the court include the:

• prohibition of cruelty to animals;
• provisions preventing animal nuisances;
• restrictions on tethering animals in a cruel or neglectful manner;
• provisions concerning impoundment and license revocation;
• restrictions on sales of dangerous and potentially dangerous dogs;
• provisions granting animal control the authority to seize animals of owners violating the ordinance;
• requirements for veterinarians to report public health information, such as vaccination records and animal bites, to the government; and
• definitions of “dangerous dog,” “potentially dangerous dog,” “proper enclosures” for unaltered dogs, “nuisance,” “attack,” “restraint,” and “cruelty.”

Notably, the court also resoundingly rejected the Kennel Club’s challenges to the enforcement authority of the director of Louisville Metro Animal Services, discarding the claims of “arbitrary” and “selective” enforcement. Responding to the allegation that the director intends to conduct warrantless searches in enforcing the ordinance, the court stated that the Kennel Club and other plaintiffs “are doing battle with a bogeyman of their own conjuring.”

Other municipalities have adopted more sweeping ordinances, such as pit bull bans or mandatory spay and neuter. Louisville policymakers, after a long and unusually deliberative legislative process, adopted a comprehensive but measured approach, striking a balance between the governmental interests in public health and safety and the interests of animal owners. And the court, in upholding the core provisions of the measure, sent the message that the protection of animal welfare is an important governmental responsibility.

A Game-Changer for Shelter Pets

There’s no question that we as a society need to do more to help homeless dogs and cats find loving families, and we are even seeing the issue of pet adoption enter the public policy arena. In California, for example, Assemblyman Cameron Smyth (R-Santa Clarita) introduced a bill to allow a tax deduction for adopting an animal from a shelter, and Assemblyman Ted Lieu (D-Torrance) offered a resolution declaring September 2009 as “Adopt a Shelter Pet Month.”

But today we are celebrating the greatest investment of resources the animal protection movement has ever made to end the euthanasia of millions of healthy and treatable dogs and cats. The Ad Council, The Humane Society of the United States, and Maddie’s Fund have launched The Shelter Pet Project, a national public service advertising campaign urging pet lovers to make shelter adoption their first choice. You can read about the pathbreaking campaign for pets on Wayne Pacelle’s blog, and watch the first two TV ads—“Ditched” and “White Collar”—here.

A Double Whammy for Animal Shelters

The economic downturn is having ripple effects in nearly every part of American life, but the impact on animal shelters has been especially acute. Struggling families are relinquishing more dogs and cats to shelters, as they find they can no longer afford the costs of pet care, or they are evicted from their homes and cannot find pet-friendly housing. At the same time, municipal governments are cutting local services, and charitable giving is on the decline, so both public and private shelters have less funding. It’s a double whammy for animal shelters—greater demand but fewer resources.

Animal shelters play a critical role in our communities.

The problem may become more severe in California, as a budget deal between Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and state legislators will reduce the funding available to hold stray dogs and cats in the state’s municipal animal shelters. But some communities are taking a more forward-looking approach and trying to sustain—rather than cut—critical services.

In Lincoln County on Oregon’s central coast, the county animal shelter is scheduled to close its doors on June 30, 2010, because funding will run out. But this November, voters will decide on a new property tax that would allow animal care and control operations to continue uninterrupted. If approved, Measure 21-134 will provide funding for another five years to support the animal shelter and animal control services in the county.

With tea-party protests around the country, it’s hard to imagine voters approving a new tax. But it’s even harder to imagine what life would be like with no animal shelter and no animal control services. Without an animal shelter, homeless pets will have no place to go to find new, loving homes. Stray animals will be left to the mercy of the streets, and without animal control services, they will continue to breed and overpopulate. As their numbers grow, disease will become rampant and pose a very real threat to animal health and human health.

In fact, cutting funds for animal care and control is penny-wise and pound-foolish. Without a functioning animal shelter, other costs to the community—demands on law enforcement, county health officials, and nonprofit rescue groups—will grow. Measure 21-134 would cost the average Lincoln County property owner less than a nickel a day, while the potential costs of dealing with dog bites or a rabies epidemic would certainly be much greater.

Most people wouldn’t imagine living in an area with no school, no hospital, no police, no road maintenance, or no trash collection. An animal shelter, too, is a community institution, and shouldn’t be allowed to go under. It’s not just a quality of life issue for citizens, but a critical service in a nation that cares about animal welfare—a nation where we want to see pets cared for and adopted, not suffering and dying on our streets.

Get the Lead Out

When mourning dove hunting season begins next week—in most states except Iowa and Michigan which have resisted the entreaties of the gun lobby, and nearly all of the Northeast where the gentle songbirds have long been protected—hunters will once again discharge enormous amounts of toxic lead shot into the environment.

Mourning dove hunting season begins next week in most states.

The soft, heavy metal has been known as a toxic substance for, oh, more than 2,000 years. Lead has been banned from water pipes, paint, gasoline, glass, pottery and a host of other items in order to protect people, especially young children.

But hunters—at least some of them—have held out. The most backward thinking of the bunch continue to spew lead shot and lead ammunition by the ton across our precious outdoors, and argue for the “right” to do so.

Now, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has announced that in lieu of meaningful action on lead it wants to open yet another tedious nationwide inquiry into hunters’ views about it. That’s too bad because the incremental process of ridding our environment of extraneous lead has already dragged out for too many years.

A nationwide ban on lead shot in migratory waterfowl hunting was adopted in 1991 after biologists estimated roughly two million ducks died each year from ingesting spent lead pellets.

California recently banned lead shot in endangered condor territory because condors were dying of lead poisoning. These majestic birds who are struggling for their very survival on the planet were doing only what comes naturally to condors, eating leftovers—that is, eating the gut piles that hunters leave behind. Except that these gut piles contained lead from ammo. And surely they were also eating carcasses of animals who were wounded by hunters and left to die.

Some 23 states require nontoxic ammunition on more than 1.3 million acres of hunting areas and game habitats. These prohibitions were prompted by the devastating lead toll on an estimated 100 bird species, including bald eagles.

Last year, lead-contaminated deer meat was removed from food bank shelves and pregnant women were warned against eating such meat. More recently, Delaware announced regulations prohibiting hunters from using lead shot while dove hunting.

Really, what more needs to be said? There are plentiful nontoxic alternatives, which are only fractionally more expensive.

Unfortunately, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has announced that for its next move, it wants to conduct a “National Mourning Dove Hunter Attitude Survey on Nontoxic Shot.” These songbirds are the most heavily hunted migratory bird in the nation. And the agency says that attitudes of dove hunters will “help us make nontoxic shot policy decisions.”

Gauging the opinions of dove hunters can’t be a bad thing—it just doesn’t seem necessary in light of the overwhelming scientific evidence that cumulative lead deposits pose a significant risk to ground-feeding mourning doves and to other wildlife that directly and indirectly ingest toxic shot, including birds of prey and other animals who scavenge on downed birds.

For every dove shot and bagged, hunters discharge an average of eight shots according to a long-term study conducted by the U.S. Geological Survey and the Fish and Wildlife Service. Densities of greater than 860,000 pellets per hectare have been reported in dove fields, which are usually crop-growing soils. 

You’d think that hunters themselves would be clamoring to stop the systematic poisoning of our environment—which only diminishes their supply of game birds and other animals. After all, are they conservationists or just willful polluters?

While many rank-and-file sportsmen would gladly pay a couple dollars more for a box of nontoxic shells, the hunting industry leadership—like the National Rifle Association and U.S. Sportsmen’s Alliance—again stand in the way. These are the same groups, according to Ted Williams, who protested the ban on lead shot for waterfowl hunting in 1991, and called it “the latest scalp in a well-organized, scarcely recognized series of flanking attacks upon the right to keep and bear arms.” Despite the doom-and-gloom rhetoric, hunters know two decades later that was a good decision for waterfowl, and didn’t lead to the end of duck or goose hunting.

What’s good for the goose is good for other birds, too. The new Obama Administration needs to turn away from old habits and not allow the wishes of hunters to delay sound scientific management of our precious outdoors. A good start would be to cancel this unimportant hunter survey and just get the lead out for the sake of fish and wildlife—and everyone who cares about our wildlands.