[ SHOWGSD-L ] how HEART passed
- From: Peggy <pmick12@xxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: Showgsd-l <Showgsd-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Fri, 29 Sep 2006 14:47:52 -0400
shared by Peggy
As a 3 year resident of Albuquerque
(and likely to stay at least long enough to allow our two teenagers to
graduate from high school), this is of course of great personal interest to
me. I know there are many people on this list and elsewhere that believe
that this could never happen in their communities--one person even told me
that if the people of Albuquerque were stupid enough to elect councilmembers
who would support this, then we got what we deserved. Allow me to share
some of the things that went on:
This ordinance was first presented about two years ago, and withdrawn and
"rewritten" by its sponsor at least twice, each time with her claiming that
she was soliciting input from the pet-owning community.
Every time the ordinance was listed for discussion on the agenda for the
City Council meeting, people showed up in huge numbers (standing room only
on many nights) to oppose the ordinance. This was in spite of it being
added to or removed from that night's agenda literally at the last minute
several times.
PR spin was definitely on the side of the animal rights activists. Anybody
speaking against the ordinance was portrayed by those in favor of it,
including the Albuquerque Journal, as greedy breeders who didn't care what
happened to the animals. Only the most "reasonable" provisions in the 66
page ordinance, such as requiring all pets to be microchipped, were cited.
Euthanasia statistics were misrepresented in order to exaggerate the pet
overpopulation problem. The figure of 18,000 dogs and cats put down/year
has been routinely quoted, which includs not only adoptable animals in the
city's shelters, but also ones that were unadoptable due to advanced age,
illness, or temperament problems, as well as all the pets put down at a
private vet at the request of their owners.
The night it finally passed, several council members expressed misgivings
but voted for it anyway, perhaps because they did not want the media to
protray them as not caring about the animals. One councilmember even went
as far as to say that although the HEART ordinance has a lot of problems, it
is "a step in the right direction."
We did fight it. The other side was very well-organized and had the media
on their side. Everytime we thought we had defeated it, the sponsor brought
it back. We're still fighting it, and I expect that even if we win this
lawsuit that the RGKC is bringing against the city and the HEART ordinance
is thrown out, the animal rights activists will come back with something
new.
Be afraid. Because your town could be next.
Lisa
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