Big Paws Only Dog Forums
BPO Legislation Forum => Bills & Other Legislative Acts => : Saljen July 25, 2005, 05:17:02 PM
-
here is a story that was on the front pg of our newspaper thursday. has anyone else seen this? sorry if the topic over these specific laws has already been discussed and i missed it, but i just think this is horrible. it actually goes kind of beyond horrible, to me its rather TERRIFYING. that officials can come to our homes and take our dogs away from us and destroy them based on nothing more than how they LOOK? at an average of THREE A DAY just in DENVER? what on earth is going on??? and more importantly, what can we do about this? and if you want to see a very sad pic of a beautiful but scared looking impounded pit that goes with the story, go to http://www.lawton-constitution.com/ftpage/072105.pdf
Dogs in hiding — critics
blast Denver pit bull ban
DENVER (AP) — A few weeks ago, two
police cars and two animal control vehicles
pulled up at the home of Stef’ny Steffan
looking for her beloved 4-year-old pit bull,
Xena. Seven officers hauled the animal off
to the city shelter, putting her on death row.
Xena became an outlaw after Denver won
a court fight and reinstated one of the
toughest pit-bull bans in the nation. Since
May, more than 380 dogs have been impounded
and at least 260 destroyed — an average
of more than three a day.
Dog owners are in a panic. Some are using
an underground railroad of sorts, sending
their pets to live elsewhere or hiding them
from authorities. City officials would not estimate
how many people might be violating
the ordinance.
Some owners, like Steffan, have won a reprieve
for their pets with help from a rescue
group. The group got Xena released by
signing an affidavit stating that the animal
would never return to Denver. The group
took the dog to Mariah’s Promise in Divide,
an animal sanctuary that has accepted more
than three dozen pit bulls from Denver.
For Steffan and her partner, Gina Black,
leaving Xena 60 miles from home was a
lousy option but the only one they had.
“It’s safer than animal control. Safer than
keeping her underground — at least she’ll
be able to play now,” Steffan said. “But
she’ll miss us. We’re her pack.”
Denver is one of three major metropolitan
areas, along with Miami and Cincinnati,
to ban pit bulls, according to Glen Bui, vice
president of the American Canine Foundation.
Pit bull typically describes three kinds of
dogs — the American Pit Bull Terrier,
American Staffordshire Terrier and the
Staffordshire Bull Terrier. But Denver’s
ban applies to any dog that looks like a pit
bull. The animal’s actual behavior does not
matter.
City Councilman Charlie Brown said that
in his judgment, “pit bulls are trained to attack.
They’re bred to do that.”
Critics of the ban use words like “annihilation”
and “genocide,” and the city shelter
has received e-mails likening animal control
officers to Nazis.
“Breed bans are just a knee-jerk reaction
to something that happened in the community,”
Bui said.
Denver banned pit bulls in 1989 after
dogs mauled a minister and killed a boy in
separate attacks. The Legislature passed a
law in 2004 that prohibited breed-specific
bans, but the city sued and a judge ruled in
April the law was an unconstitution al violation
of local control.
Critics of the ordinance say that a blanket
ban on an entire breed is misguided that the
law should instead target irresponsible
owners and all dangerous dogs.
-
Well, we stopped prohibition when people finally realized that it didn't work, how can we stop this? I hate stupid people, stupid cities and stupid laws like this.
Peggy
-
I think education is the key - education for everyone, not just the folks who don't have a dog or who think all dogs are dangerous (and yes, I've met grown professional men who believe *all* dogs, in all sizes, are dangerous). Great ambassador dogs, the good-will dogs who love to be petted, who have their canine good citizen merit or who are simply fabulous and well-behaved, can demonstrate to uninformed people that dogs can be gentle, law-abiding ;-) companions.
Education for the uninformed future dog owner about puppy mills, BYB and irresponsible ownership.
Education for our community leaders so they don't shift into panic response instead of considering the problem's multi-sources and how to effectively address those sources.
Education for dog owners ... all of us are responsible for training, managing and controlling our dogs. It's not about us making others love our dogs. Some folks will never love dogs and that's their right. But regardless, our dogs should always be well-behaved and under our control - in the home and out. I've seen dog lovers admire their undisciplined dogs who jump and lick and pounce and overwhelm strangers with affection. The owners think it's great that their dogs love people, but to me, even though these dogs are friendly, that unruly behavior is unacceptable.
Education for our dogs, so they can be happy, healthy and long-lived companions.
JMHO.
- Teresa
-
Education is absolutely key.
Good leash laws properly enforced are important.
Please read "THANK GOD FOR FOOTBALL" to see exactly where we are with the BSL in this country.
IT's time to organize and take action.
-
We ALL need to take action one this, All of North America does( I'm from Canada :)) It is happening everywhere and it need to stop!!! Why should the animals pay when it is man that has done them wrong to begin with?? Stupid owners made them agressive, made them fight ect. It's not fair and needs to stop.
Nina
-
We ARE organizing.
Join us.
:D
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/NATIONWIDEDOGMARCH/
-
I am so in ;D Let's kick some banning butt!!
Nina
-
is thtat yahoo group really about not banning pits? it seems that it is about defeating legeslation that has more to do with puppy mills and such. Can you explain the connection better for those of us that aren't up on the latest legal issues.
-
does anyone know of groups doing work specifically on stopping, or getting rid of these bans? The big policy issues like the yahoo group posted above are super important too, but i also like working on more specific actions. I know san francisco was thinking about enacting a ban last time i was up visiting my parents. anyone who lives up there heard anyting about that lately?
-
Hi, I have had a problem with this just within the past week. I have a 9 month old American Mastiff puppy (140 lbs) who was almost confiscated by the police (and certianly sent to die) in Miami. For background - I live in Fort Lauderdale - about 20 miles from Miami. I went to visit my friend who lives in Miami and took my puppy with me - like usual. He was sitting up looking out the window when a police officer pulled me over and started asking about my dog. This wouldn't normally bother me (I have had lots of people ask me about him) but I couldnt help notice that he had his hand on his gun the entire time. Then when I couldn't provide proof of breed he wanted to have him impounded until a positive ID could be made (who carries proof of breed...?). This is all regardless of the fact that he had his tags (Broward County) and there was nothing to reason that he might be a dangerous dog. Luckily... we spoke to the officers' sergent eventually - after telling him to get his sergent or arrest me - because I was NOT giving up my dog, and the sergent agreed that Goliath was definately NOT a pitbull.
The point is that it shows how fanatical all of this can get.........
How anyone could confuse my dog with a pitbull is beyond me. Even worse is the fact that they are killing pitbulls by the dozens and 99.9999% have never done anything wrong or shown any inclination toward agression. I am far more worried about bad owners then "bad dogs".
-
I don't know of any groups, but you may want to check out the AKC page for their dog-related legislation alerts. I just subscribed to it, so I really can't say how great it is, but from what I saw on their site (they have an archive), it looks comprehensive. I'm hoping it will give me a starting point for voicing my opinion. ;-)
- Teresa
-
stories like this make me want to cry. especially sinse my pup is an unknown mix of breeds, so i could never provide proof of breed! How could people think it ok to kill perfectly nice dogs just because they look like they might be a breed of dog that has occasionally been trained to fight. it seems like the burden of proof here is turned totally upside down!! i have to prove my puppy isnt a pit? and even then shouldnt they have to prove he is mean, or at least give me a chance to prove he isnt?
grrrrrr.......
-
oh, i forgot to put in this... one of my favorite rescues.
they have all sorts of info about this issue, as well as information specific to california for us west coasters!
http://www.badrap.org/rescue/
-
sorry to say but it wont stop with the pit it will keep going in denver till we the people stand up for our constituianal (excuse my spelling please) rights and tell the goverment we have had enough they are slowly taking our rights away one at a time they think they are beyond who they work for as pet owners we are going to have to force them to hear us to be honest i am seriously think to do what the men did a few years ago an angry moms i think it needs to be done for our furbabies before they are all gone there are more pet owners in this country then not we need to march on to washington to be heard as well as keep sending petitions to congress an our states
-
AT BPO HAVE A DREAM WHERE ALL BREEDS ARE WELCOME AND SAFE FROM THE HARM OF CONGRESS AND IRRESPONSIBLE BREEDERS, AND DOG FIGHTERS.
March on march on lol
-
yes there is a yahoo site who is fighting bsl give me some time an i will get the link for you ok
-
i just find all of this frightening. Proliant's story of being stopped on the street with a cop prepared to confiscate their dog is just mind-boggling to me. does this sound like nazi germany to anyone? i know that we are talking about dogs and not humans, but to most of us here i think that our dogs are just as important as a human family members. i just don't see how this isn't stepping on our rights.
it goes right along with too much else going on in this country. i'm not getting into specific politics here becasue i don't want to offend anyone, but i think that no matter WHAT political party you're with, you've got to see that there's a lot of weird stuff going on lately, and that our rights are being tampered with on a near daily basis. this country is going in a very specific direction, and i for one don't like where it could possibly lead to.
and now, our state govts are just deciding based on no real credible evidence (since when have their not been dog attacks?) that certain breeds are now too dangerous to be owned, and even in some places, EXIST??? i read that list of breeds posted in another topic ... its practically every popular dog in this country over 30lbs! what is that list specifically? will they be banning those as well?
in another topic, someone said that rotts have killed 30 people in 15 years in the US. you cannot DO this stuff based on these kind of statistics! 2 deaths a year? that is LAUGHABLE! how many more people than that drown in pools? die of lung cancer just from SECOND HAND SMOKE ALONE? are killed by guns? wreck their motorcycles? heck, more people probably die every year from tripping on their darned shoelaces than are killed by dogs. does that mean we should BAN shoelaces? OF COURSE NOT. but my point is, by the same logic as calling these dogs dangerous just because there are a few inevitable deaths which are just a part of LIFE, then you should be banning anything else that causes as much as or more harm! but obviously, that is not happening. i am just not sure what the specific agenda here is. and i don't understand how they can be doing this to us. unfortunately, it is happening because we're letting it. we do need to organize. SERIOUSLY organize. does anyone know of any groups that have a high profile that aren't just nutjobs like peta? it seems like if you could get a very visible well-known group on-board, then you could at least have a better chance of being heard.
-
well as i said before you want to be heard think about marching on the white house an your state capital just like the million man march an mad mothers did they got heard an what they wanted we need to do the same its time for all pet owners to be heard but thats something no one seems to want to do an one person cant do it by themselves we need to ban together to make it work
-
It is so sadd that are nationa has come to this... the last dog I owned name was Tyson! I rescued him from an abusive home ! He was abused so bad he wouldnt even walk into a room he just stayed in one spot untill he felt safe! These dogs have such a battle out here already they dont need to fight the death penilty too!! They are made to be fighters these dogs are just as loving as any other!! Its just a shame we dont have laws to protect them and stop people from turning them into fighters instead we just kill them??? Thas crazy!!! My tyson is now in a loving home doing very well!! happy and living with another dog and a cat and a big back yard!!! Heres some pictures of aloving pittbull!!
-
I think the most dangerous thing about a pit would be the owner! These dogs are just getting into the wrong hands, and the good owners are the ones who are suffering. Our laws in Northern Ontario for Pit Bulls is not quite so strict. Im not exactly sure what the laws are but from what I have heard, the law is that all Pit Bulls need to be spayed or neutered and when they are being walked the owner must wear a muzzle on their dogs to prevent any attacks. This seems like a sufficiant law and alot more humaine than killing them!
More responsible pit owners is the answer here not death!
-
so right its the bad owners giving them such a horrible name its like they have forgotten petey from the original little rascals he was a good dog an a pit
-
We were at Walmart today and matt asked me for a quarter to get candy out of the vending machine (And yes he's 23 years old). While he was deciding between Skittles and those Fruit shaped things, I was looking at the other machine. In one of them were these figurines called "Homies". Front and Center are too big hispanic guys holding back pitbulls on chains. Seeing this thread made me want to look up their website. I couldn't find those two figurines, but they have a whole section dedicated to their "Outlaw" canines. On the front page of their Dog pound it says
"These Hardcore Dogs Been Picked up by animal control officers and deemed hostile, unsociable and aggressive in behavior. No one has ever attempted to claim or adopt them. Therefore they are doing HARD TIME. They have developed their own social structure inside Cell -Block C (where they are kept). These dogs are not allowed to mingle with the other dogs. They don't get to share the yard or work out with the general population. Things like bones and doggy snacks smuggled in from the outside create their monetary system. Yes, it's a dog eat dog world inside the Dog Pound...
http://www.homies.tv/dogpound/dogpound_home.htm
People like this are the reasons that pits are regarded the way they are. When it's OK to make Children's toys with pits being portryaed as viscious lunging killers, then obviously there's going to be no chaning the public's mind.
Ang
Edited to add:
I found this under the regular character listing.
http://www.homies.tv/homies_chato.htm
-
they are another axample of bad owners that is why it is up to us good owners to change that way of thinking
-
well as i said before you want to be heard think about marching on the white house an your state capital just like the million man march an mad mothers did they got heard an what they wanted we need to do the same its time for all pet owners to be heard but thats something no one seems to want to do an one person cant do it by themselves we need to ban together to make it work
YES! absolutely! i'm all for it. who else is with the idea of banding together to form a group, organize a march, etc.?
and if we're talking about this, there must be MANY MANY others ready to do something about it as well.
-
cool i fully believe it is something that is going to have to be done the fun part will be getting enough people together to do it
-
ANKY - that absolutely sickens me. i've seen those 'homies' before around here too. but i had no idea about how they were portraying dogs.
in my town (Lawton, OK) there is a fairly bad gang problem and along with it, a large amount of dog fighting. its disgusting. you can see in many backyards of gang territory neighborhoods (we just moved out of one), rows of kennels all with pit bulls - looking underfed and acting very aggressive. i know that people who dog fight often starve them so that the animal is more viscious. we once had a beautiful pit wander into our yard, ribs protruding out horribly, battered ears, and just as friendly as he could be. we fed him. and fed him and fed him. the poor thing would gobble down anything we put in front of him. we finally put him in the backyard with our two Westies. he was afraid of the Westies! he was one of the sweetest dogs we'd ever seen. we started trying to find a home for him but couldn't. we contacted the local Humane Society and another animal rescue group, but they couldn't help us either. all these groups did at the time was find foster homes for cats~! both groups did tell us tho that if we called the pound, they wouldn't even adopt him out and by city law, would just kill him immediately. i just couldn't hand the poor creature over to a death sentence. and at the time, it was my mother's house i was living in, and she said she just couldn't have a pit bull living in her home (my mom unfortunately clings to her pit misconceptions and is afraid of them). she also said she didn't think we could afford him tho either. the poor thing had something wrong with his mouth and his tail, and we probably couldn't have afforded the vet bills. so finally, one night my father let him go. we all cried. we couldn't figure anything else out. fortunately at least he did just take off down the street, seeming happy to roam rather than being sad that we put him out. we never saw him again either, so i hope he found a home. a REAL home that is. there was a house of gang members just around the corner from us with pits, and we figure he probably had come from there. he was EXTREMELY starved, and yet he wasn't dirty at all, so it was as if he had been starved under someone's care. he was just SO sweet and a big of a chicken really, so if he did come from there, they probably threw him out because he wouldn't fight.
it just makes me sick that this beautiful, loyal breed is being used this way by some people because they think its COOL and the macho thing to do. complete idiots.