Educating Elected Officials

Many of you remember the campaign again AB1634 in 2007 and 2008. One of the surprising thing that came out of that campaign was the admission by the office of the author, Assembly Member Lloyd Levine, that elected officials do not check the facts on bills that are brought or suggested; they are interested only in impact or in some cases publicity. As a results hundreds of thousands of dollars were spent on both sides to get either emotional arguments or facts before the legislators. At the state level, where there is some concern about constituents, the facts prevailed in the end and the bill was defeated.

But to accomplish that end it required teams of people writing, calling and talking to every legislator’s office weekly if not daily, to undo the damage done by Levine.

We can never find ourselves in that position again and so CDOC has created the Legislative Grid. This is a group of volunteers from around the state. We need 120 because we need one for every senator and assembly member. These volunteers are provided with information on a quarterly basis for the legislator from his or her constituents. By letting the elected officials know what the facts show, what is being done by our community to support the needs of dogs and local shelters and what the adverse effects of legislation can be, we can be the people are part of all discussions about legislation and regulation.

Once we have people matched up at the state level, we need to do the same thing at the local levels. Having failed at the state, it is clear that animal rights people are pursuing their agenda of spay and neuter at four months of age in spite of statements from veterinarian organizations and research scientists around the world.

CDOC provides training on all these issues at their Alternative Symposia so don’t worry if this is new to you. You leave an expert.

Alternative Legislation

There are steps we can take to be a part of the solution. Dog overpopulation, within California, (as opposed to the thousands of dogs that are shipped in from midwest puppy mills to the pet stores and from shelters in other states and countries), is easy to control. Dogs that are not running loose are not creating unwanted litters. We have leash laws; they need to be enforced. This is a public safety issue and we need to hold our officials accountable.

There needs to be a mechanism to alter dogs that are repeatedly running loose in the community. There are many ways to positively and permanently identify dogs so we know which ones are repeat offenders.

Our state is having huge financial problems. We need to have legislation to prohibit the importation of unowned dogs just so other states and countries can empty their shelters.

We need your help with solutions.

What We Have Already Done

The only positive dog legislation to pass was sponsored by Concerned Dog Owners of California and carried by Assembly Member Tony Mendoza. AB2291 added a check off box to the California Personal Income Tax Form. The monies are available to municipal shelters so they can offer low cost spay and neuter to those who are seeking it. This bill was signed by the Governor. It was fast tracked by the Franchise Tax Board. It is on the current tax form. We have only two years to prove that we can make this work.

CDOC helped a local southern California veterinarian partner with a private animal welfare group, Actors and Other For Animals. This is a great solution for them and should be a model of what we can do in the future.