Lessons From
Dallas Spay/Neuter Mandate
Californians Could Face $50 million Unfunded Mandate
Based On Dallas Experience - MA, FL, IL & AZ Take Note
by
John Yates -
American Sporting Dog Alliance
DALLAS,
TX (July 7, 2009) – A year ago, Dallas City Council
voted to enter the brave new world of a mandatory spay
and neuter ordinance for dogs. That vote was based on
the promise by animal rights group supporters of lower
animal shelter admissions, a lower euthanasia rate, and
an increase in licensing revenues to support the animal
control program.
A year after the Dallas
ordinance was passed, those promises have proven to be
fraudulent, based on actual budget data from the Dallas
Animal Control program that was obtained by the American
Sporting Dog Alliance. In looking at all of the promises
made in Dallas, the actual results have proven to be
diametrically opposite of what City Council had hoped it
was voting to do.
Now, the California
Legislature is close to passing a statewide spay/neuter
mandate, similar legislation is on the table in
Massachusetts, and municipal ordinances are pending in
Chicago and communities in Texas, Arizona, New Mexico
and Florida. We ask citizens and lawmakers in those
states to pay close attention to the Dallas experience.
Based on what happened in
Dallas, municipal governments in California could be
facing a de facto
state mandate for $50 million in unplanned local
spending, and their shelters would be overflowing with
dogs facing a future without hope. We are making this
evidence available to the California Assembly Committee
on Appropriations, which has scheduled a July 15 hearing
on Senate Bill 250. SB 250, which already has passed the
Senate and is the closest thing possible to a statewide
mandate to spay or neuter all dogs and cats.
The American Sporting Dog
Alliance predicted adverse results in Dallas, based on
the actual experiences of every city in America that has
passed a mandatory pet sterilization ordinance. However,
Dallas City Council chose to ignore the facts and fall
for the hollow promises of animal rights activists, such
as Robert “Skip” Trimble, the darling of People for the
Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) and the Humane
Society of the United States.
A year later, the Dallas
experience has proven to be a fiscal disaster, and a
nightmare for anyone who loves dogs and the dogs
themselves.
The Dallas experience
provides reasonable evidence of what can be expected to
happen in California if SB 250 is passed into law.
Dallas has a population of 1.3 million people.
California, at 36.8 million, is 28 times more populous
than Dallas. Thus, a reasonable expectation can be
obtained by multiplying the Dallas numbers by 28.
Here is a summary of what
has happened in Dallas, and what is likely to happen in
California, based on official Dallas budget documents:
-
While animal rights activists were telling City
Council that a spay/neuter mandate would reduce
shelter admissions, the 2008-09 city budget called
for a 10-percent increase in animal shelter
admissions. The budget was designed to “increase
the number of animals impounded by 10% to 37,000.”
Thus, if AB 250 is passed, California municipalities
can reasonably expect a 10% increase in shelter
admissions, and this legislation would be an
unfunded state mandate to pay for these additional
animals. In California, it is illegal for the state
to force municipalities to accept unfounded
mandates, without full reimbursement for the costs.
-
In the 2007-08 fiscal
year, actual expenses for the animal control program
were pegged at $6.4 million. The 2008-09 budget
calls for spending $7.8 million, which is a $1.4
million increase, or 22-percent. Extrapolating from
those numbers, Californians also might be expected
to see a 22-percent cost increase to municipal
government (and taxpayers), to about $39 million.
That, too, would be a
de facto
unfunded mandate from the state.
-
While expenses are
escalating, license sale revenues have plunged in
Dallas. The fiscal year loss of pet license sales is
projected to be in excess of $400,000. That means
the Animal Control Department will have to take care
of more animals on less money. License sales drop
because people who cannot comply with the
spay/neuter mandate cannot obtain a license without
proof of sterilization. This has been proven in
every municipality that has tried a spay/neuter
mandate, and now has been proven again this year in
Dallas and Los Angeles, which recently passed a
similar ordinance. Based on the Dallas experience,
California municipalities can expect to see a
corresponding $11.2 million drop in license sales.
This, too, is a
de facto unfunded mandate from the state.
Here is
a link for Dallas budget information:
http://www.dallascityhall.com/Budget/adopted0809/CleanHealthyEnvironment.pdf.
The American Sporting Dog
Alliance is not the only organization that is projecting
a large de facto
unfounded mandate if SB 250 passes into law.
Our conclusion is shared
by the California Department of Finance, which recently
released a report on SB 250: “This bill would result in
a substantial increase to the General Fund…to reimburse
local government shelters’ cost to care for impounded
animals. Given the current economic climate, requiring
the owners of dogs and cats to pay for sterilization
procedures would result in more animals being abandoned
or surrendered because of the owners' inability to
finance the sterilization procedure and pay additional
fines.”
That means millions more
healthy and adoptable animals will be euthanized at
animal shelters that are already swamped by dogs and
cats that had to be abandoned by their owners due to
home foreclosures and job losses. When people lose their
homes, pets become homeless, too. When people lose their
jobs, they cannot afford to sterilize animals or even
take care of them in many cases. The inevitable result
is a rapid increase in abandonment and euthanasia at
animal shelters.
Such is the murderous
intent of the animal rights movement, which seeks to
gradually eliminate animals from American life. Its
immediate goal is to force people to sterilize or
euthanize as many dogs and cats as possible, and SB 250
was written for this reason. Our research has clearly
documented that spay/neuter mandates in Los Angeles,
other California communities and elsewhere have
bankrupted animal control programs and led to
large-scale pet abandonment and rapid rises in shelter
euthanasia rates. Our research shows a 30-percent
increase in shelter euthanasia and a 20-percent increase
in admission rates since the Los Angeles ordinance was
passed a year ago. At the same time, the Los Angeles
Animal Control Department has been devastated
financially by a drastic reduction in license revenues
and large increases in expenses.
The Department of Finance
report to the Legislature concluded that “the Department
of Finance is opposed to this measure because it would
increase costs for an existing state-mandated local
program, potentially create a new state mandated local
program, and result in General Fund costs that are not
included in the 2009-10 Budget Act. Mandatory spay and
neuter provisions have failed throughout California at
the local government level.”
In California, the
official unemployment rate has soared to 11.5-percent,
real unemployment is estimated at 20-percent, the
unemployment rate is projected to be 12.5-percent by the
end of the year, home foreclosures and business failures
are the highest in the nation and approach Great
Depression levels, state government is facing an
immediate $24.3 billion budget deficit and is paying its
bills with IOU’s, and essential services are being
decimated. Of the 10 U.S. cities with the highest rates
of foreclosures, California has six. An estimated
200,000 jobs have been lost in California in the past
year alone. Some communities already have been forced to
eliminate fire protection, cut their police forces,
shutter services and close schools. In addition, more
than $15 billion in tax increases are being proposed,
massive layoffs of state and municipal employees are
planned, an energy tax alone would result in the loss of
an estimated 10,000 jobs, prisoners would be dumped in
the streets and most would no longer have probationary
supervision, and elderly, disabled and blind people
would lose $1.4 billion in state benefits, programs to
help them remain in their homes, and protections that
now allow them to save their homes from tax sales. The
state’s future will be mortgaged by $10.3 billion in
loans to keep government afloat and by the deterioration
of infrastructure such as roads and bridges. California
already has the highest sales and business taxes in the
nation, and the second highest income taxes.
In light of California’s
devastated economy and $24.3 billion budget deficit, it
would be sheer fiscal insanity to pass SB 250 into law.
The statewide
consequences would be inevitable and bleak. The result
will be people and local governments pushed over the
financial edge and into the abyss, and the highest price
will be paid by millions of dogs and cats that will lose
their homes and face almost certain death in overcrowded
animal shelters.
Economic impacts are really impacts on people and their pets.
San Francisco Chronicle
Columnist Christi Keith wrote an extraordinary analysis
of these impacts in the June 9, 2009, edition of the
paper (http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/g/a/2009/06/09/petscol060909.DTL).
It is the best writing on
mandatory spay/neuter laws we have seen in any major
newspaper. “When did the party of ‘Yes, we can!’ become
the party of ‘No, you'd better not’ when it comes to
dogs and cats?,” Keith wrote.
Her column continues:
“Under the bill, every California pet owner must obtain
a license to keep a dog or cat who hasn't been
sterilized, a license that can be revoked if the owner
violates a number of
animal laws -- not just big ones like animal cruelty and
neglect, but little ones, like letting your dog stand
next to your car in a beach parking beach without his
leash on. If that happens, you can be forced to spay or
neuter your pet, unless a veterinarian certifies that
the animal would ‘suffer serious harm or death if
surgically sterilized.’ If a pet owner can't afford that
option or refuses to comply, the animals can be seized
and sterilized or even killed at taxpayer expense.
Keith correctly identifies
the root of the problem, and also the impact of SB 250.
“Both
the
American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to
Animals (ASPCA) and the
Association of Pet Product Manufacturers
report that nearly all family pets are already spayed or
neutered -- except those belonging to poor people.
“While spay/neuter rates
among pets owned by middle and upper income people
approach 90 percent, only 53 percent of pets owned by
poor people are spayed or neutered. The majority of
lower income owners say they want to alter their pets
but either can't afford to pay for the surgery and/or
can't get their pets to a facility that will do it.
“In many communities, no
form of public or private assistance is available to
defray the cost of spay and neuter surgeries, which
range from less than $100 for a cat to $900 for a very
large dog, depending on local veterinary rates. And for
people without a car, simply transporting pets to
clinics or hospitals can be nearly impossible.
“The progressive solution
would be to fund free and accessible spay/neuter for
people who want to alter their pets but can't afford the
procedure. That's what happened in New Hampshire, which
subsequently saw its shelter intake numbers plummet and
its euthanasia rate drop by 75 percent. Many California
communities, including San Francisco, have done the
same, with similar results.”
We applaud Ms. Keith.
The American Sporting Dog
Alliance is urging all California dog owners to take
immediate action, before the Assembly Committee on
Appropriations holds a hearing on SB 250 on July 15. It
is urgent that a large number of Californians express
clear opposition to SB 250, which is very close to being
passed into law..
Remember that the
Appropriations Committee deals mostly with financial
aspects of legislation, such as the outlay of government
funds.
Please phone and also
email each member of the committee as soon as possible.
Members of legislative committee represent all
Californians, not just their own constituents. Here is
contact information for all of the committee members:
The California Legislature
is slated to adjourn on July 18 for summer recess, and
SB 250 could face a vote of the full Assembly on July
17..
To read our analysis of the
legislation, please visit:
http://eaglerock814.proboards.com/index.cgi?action=display&board=general&thread=48
To read the actual text of
the legislation, go to:
http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/pub/09-10/bill/sen/sb_0201-0250/sb_250_bill_20090528_amended_sen_v95.html
Thank you for helping
California pet owners and the dogs and cats that they
love.
The American Sporting Dog Alliance represents owners, breeders and professionals
who work with breeds of dogs that are used for hunting.
We also welcome people who work with other breeds, as
legislative issues affect all of us. We are a grassroots
movement working to protect the rights of dog owners,
and to assure that the traditional relationships between
dogs and humans maintains its rightful place in American
society and life.
The American Sporting Dog
Alliance also needs your help so that we can continue to
work to protect the rights of dog owners. Your
membership, participation and support are truly
essential to the success of our mission. We are funded
solely by your donations in order to maintain strict
independence.
Please visit us on the web
at
http://www.americansportingdogalliance.org
Our
email is
asda@csonline.net.
Please
Join Us
This report is archived at
http://eaglerock814.proboards.com/index.cgi?action=display&board=general&thread=50
New Data Shows Slaughterhouse After Los Angeles
Spay/Neuter Law, L.A. Shelter Admissions and Euthanasia
11 Times Higher Than State Average, Predict Disaster If
SB 250 Becomes State Law
