Statewide no kill ballot measure proposed in California

A reader sent me a link to a statewide no kill statute that its supporters are trying to get onto California's November 2008 ballot.



Dubbed the Pet Animal Protection Act, it states:

No animal should be killed if the animal can be placed in a suitable home, if a private sheltering agency or rescue group is willing to take care and custody of the animal for purposes of adoption, or, in the case of feral cats, if they can be sterilized and released to their habitats.

It would also require shelters to change the way they handle stray animals, prohibit the killing of neonatal puppies and kittens, mandate that public shelters be open seven days a week and during hours when working people can go to the shelter, and a wide variety of other animal care and public policy provisions. The entire proposed measure can be reviewed here.



The proposal is currently being reviewed by the Attorney General, a process that takes 15 days. If the measure will have a fiscal impact, it will require an additional 25 day review for a financial analysis to be made.



If the proposal makes it out of the AG's office, its supporters will have five months to collect 434,000 signatures from registered voters; most such efforts try to obtain 650,000 to account for signatures that are disallowed.



If enough signatures are received, the measure will appear on the November 2008 ballot. If approved by the voters, it will go into effect the next day.



The measure has been proposed by some of the same people who opposed California's mandatory spay/neuter law (AB 1634, currently shelved). One of the accusations I heard quite frequently during the debate over that bill was that if opponents really cared about California's shelter animals, they'd come up with a proposal of their own instead of just attacking this one.



I guess someone was listening. It will be interesting to see if the measure can make it onto the ballot, and just who will be on what side if it does.

Comments

[Jessica Hekman]

There's a lot of really great stuff in there, but I'm worried that the consequences of some of the suggested mandates haven't been thought through. For example, the requirements for the ACO job are pretty strict. I'd love to see all ACOs be certified animal trainers, but it seems unrealistic to me to expect that to happen (I imagine chaos as 100% of the ACOs currently employed suddenly become unemployable). I also really don't like the idea of mandating how long a shelter must be open, in the case of non-profit shelters doing the best they can with limited resources.



It's also not clear to me who's going to inspect shelters for non-compliance.



I really do like the public accountability section (shelters have to publish statistics on how many animals they place vs kill).



I'm not sure if I'd vote for this if I were a CA resident, but it's a step in the right direction.

[2CatMom]

On the surface it seems reasonable, but I'm a little concerned about the neonatal provision. Please see Doolittler's excellent blog on the subject: http://www.dolittler.com/index.cfm/2007/5/7/Feline-abortion-often-an-unnerving-necessity

[Lis]

Neonatal euthanasia is not the same thing as a spay/abortion. One's after the kittens are born; the other is before they're born. Dr. Khuly has misgivings about feline abortion, even though she finds it necessary in some circumstances; for that very reason, I seriously doubt she's in favor of euthanizing very young, but healthy, kittens for reasons of space.

[2CatMom]

Lis - oops! You're right. I didn't read this carefully enough. My bad!

[Gina Spadafori]

Of course, as we've seen in the McCarthy tactics used in response to your SFGate.com column on the no-kill movement, it's clear that the mandatory spay-neuter advocates will not accept anything that doesn't follow what THEY want, even if it will help place more animals in loving homes. Sad.

[trucorgi]

BRAVO!!!!

[Ed Sky]

Why is it that reasonable initiatives go to the public for a vote but unreasonable ones, like AB1634, go to the state legislature, circumventing the will of the people?



I still feel like we escaped that one by the skin of our teeth!

[Bernard J. (Bernie) Starzewski]

Here in Wisconsin I do not believe we have a law to this effect but locally the Humane Society shelters have essentially the same thing as their standard policy. It seems to work well for them but I know it take a great deal of effort and commitment.



They try to raise funds in a variety of ways including selling put supplies and food. They also look for personal and business sponsors to pay for ads featuring pictures of orhapned pets.



I got both my Brandy and little Scout there and they do a fine job. It might be worth contacting someone here to get some comments. The woman at the local shelter writes a collumn for our paper http://www.htrnews.com where you can also see the latest pet pics available.

[Bernard J. (Bernie) Starzewski]

Err... that should have been "...selling PET supplies..." dumb me!

[Jennifer J]

Hi Christie, OT but I just got home the BCA National Weekend and asked our Health Chair Re: the current status of the cystinuria research. Our charitable fund voted last year to support ongoing research but the current problem seems to be that AKC/CHF is simply not communicating well. Efforts are goiung to be made to get some answers as to the state of the research and what needs to be done to get it back on trck. I'll let you know when I do.

ps, great article in SFGate

[Gailtrail]

Thank you! Bravo! How do we get 'The Pet Animal Protection Act' on a National Ballot? This needs to be a National mandate!



I'll be linking to your site on my web site! We need to get this out to as many people as possible!