Sign The Petition To Ask St. Albans City Council To Adopt Huntington's Dog Tethering Ordinance

I signed the electronic petition to give St. Albans dogs the same protection from cruel tethering that the City of Huntington gave their dogs 4 years ago. You can sign the petition, too. Click this link: http://www.thepetitionsite.com/318/410/863/stop-tethering-dogs-in-st-albans-wv/#next_action

Cities all over the United States and Canada are enacting city ordinances that protect dogs from being tethered outside without access to food, water, shelter and companionship. Tethered dogs live miserable, lonely lives.

We're asking St. Albans to adopt the Huntington law because it is simple and clear. Unlike the Kanawha County "Linz Law" which is riddled with exceptions and loopholes, the Huntington law makes it easy for law enforcement to see at a glance if the law is being violated. 

The Huntington law reads: "It shall be unlawful for any owner or other person controlling or possessing any dog to tether a dog outdoors without direct supervision of the animal's guardian."

Sign the petition to protect the dogs of St. Albans, WV, from cruelty on the end of a chain. Click here: http://www.thepetitionsite.com/318/410/863/stop-tethering-dogs-in-st-albans-wv/#next_action

More On Economic Development And Why Animal Abuse Is Bad For It - Even In Huntington, WV

Higginbotham At Large Sunday 24 January 2010:

In This Issue:

- Why Some Huntingtonians Need To Look Up "Vigilantism" In A Dictionary

- Why Animal Abuse Is Bad For Economic Development

Why Some Huntingtonians Need To Look Up “Vigilantism” In A Dictionary

When Huntington passed a dog-tethering ordinance certain members of Huntington’s city council tried to prevent the new ordinance’s enforcement by cautioning animal activists against “vigilantism”, by which they meant reporting violations of the law. When a well-intentioned Huntington woman made a list of Huntington residences where dogs were being tethered in violation of the law, some of them without shelter during our recent 15 degree cold snap, and handed this list to law enforcement officials she was accused of “stalking” a city councilman whose address was on the list. So worried that her group would be accused of vigilantism, one animal welfare leader actually sided with the animal abusing city councilman against the woman who turned him in.

This is why some Huntingtonians need to look up the word “vigilantism” in a dictionary. And while they’re in research mode I hope they will also go down to the Huntington police department and find out if there’s such a thing as a citizen’s arrest for, if making a citizen’s arrest is not vigilantism then certainly it is not vigilantism to report a crime – which is all the animal activist did.

Huntington, if you’re reading this blog online then you have internet access and can use Dictionary.com which defines a “vigilante” as “any person who takes the law into his or her own hands, as by avenging a crime.”

The woman who made the list of addresses where dogs were being tethered in violation of the Huntington law did not “take the law into her own hands” nor did she “avenge a crime.” She simply asked Huntington to enforce its laws and she merely reported a crime. This, folks, is good citizenship. When you see a crime being committed you are supposed to report it. Don’t they teach citizenship in Cabell County schools? Oh, you say Cabell Countians are just Wayne Countians who moved uptown? OK, don’t they teach citizenship in Wayne County schools? And how can members of council tell Huntington’s children to grow up to be good citizens if they refuse to obey and enforce Huntington’s laws?

By the way, Huntington, you can’t get this definition from a dictionary but you need to know its meaning. When a so-called humane officer, police chief, mayor or city council member says a law is “unenforceable” that’s code for “I don’t want to enforce it and you don’t have to obey it.”

Certainly any law is more enforceable when citizens are not intimidated into not reporting violations.

Incidentally, Kanawha County readers, you have a new dog tethering ordinance, too, so when you see your city councilman or your pastor or your neighbor tying his poor dog to a stake in the yard without food, water or shelter for hours at a time, don't hesitate to call the police and the Kanawha Charleston Human Association Animal Shelter. If you are dismissed as a "vigilante" or a "stalker" by your mayor or your city councilman or by a so-called humane officer, call the news media.

If you know where there’s a so-called “humane officer” who won’t investigate animal abuse laws, get them fired. If you know where there’s a city council member who violates animal abuse laws, make sure everybody in their ward knows. Oh, and report it to the news media. Shame and embarrassment often work where so-called humane officers won't. Did you ever wonder why Native Americans didn't need prisons or why the ancient religious practice of "shunning" is such an effective means of reigning in behavior that doesn't meet with society's approval?

Why Animal Abuse Is Bad For Economic Development

“We don't want tourists or businesses to perceive our community as a place that condones animal abuse," Dr. Cecelia Perrow, President, Grants/Cibola county Chamber of Commerce.

Civilized people don’t want to live in a city where their neighbors can tether an animal 24 hours a day in freezing temperatures, with no liquid water to drink and no shelter against the wind and the cold. As I’ve written in my blog before, “stray” animals and wild animals are better off than tethered dogs because a tethered or confined dog cannot go in search of warmth, water, food or shelter but even a wild raccoon can climb into the warm engine compartment of a parked car to seek some relief from the cold and a “stray” dog or cat can search or beg for food.

Suppose you were visiting friends or relatives in a city that allowed people to abuse animals either by its refusal to pass animal protection laws or its refusal to enforce them? Would you want to live there? Suppose you bought a house in a city where city council members commit crimes against animals and when you tried to report it to the police or humane officers you were scolded for “stalking” or “vigilantism”, what would you think of this town? Could you tell your business associates and friends that this is a good city in which to start a business or raise a family?

Unnecessary and preventable cruelty to animals isn’t just an ethical and moral issue it’s an economic development issue. Chambers of Commerce and other economic development organizations should help brand their cities as enlightened and civilized “creative class” cities by insisting on specific animal protection laws and their enforcement.

When asked about cockfighting's role in New Mexico's economic development, John Garcia, Secretary of Economic Development, recently said on KOAT Channel 7: "It's an absurd form of entertainment that is from the Dark Ages. I think we need to look ahead at different benefits, different industries ... prostitution has an economic impact, too, but it's not legal." In addition, the Grants/Cibola County Chamber of Commerce and the Lordsburg/Hidalgo County Chamber of Commerce both are opposed to cockfighting in their communities. "Cockfighting is not the image we want the world to have of Cibola County. We don't want tourists or businesses to perceive our community as a place that condones animal abuse," Dr. Cecelia Perrow, President, Grants/Cibola county Chamber of Commerce. (From http://www.apnm.org/)

What’s bad for your city’s brand is bad for your city’s economic development. Yes, I know your city may lose a few animal abusing rednecks if you pass and enforce laws against animal abuse but the kind of people who hurt and abuse animals for sport are not the kind of people you’re going to feature on the front page of your Chamber brochure.

Why Kanawha County's Dog Tethering Ordinance is So Important

In This Issue of Higginbotham At Large:

- Update on Kanawha County Dog Tethering Ordinance

- Next Meeting of Drinking LIberally

Kanawha County Dog Tethering Ordinance Update:

Because I was at yesterday’s public hearing on the bear hunters’ request to exempt hunting dogs from the Kanawha County anti-tethering ordinance, several people have asked me for an update on the hearing.

There’s good news and bad news. The good news is that, in Kanawha County, dogs that are not classified as “hunting dogs” are protected by an ordinance that says their owners cannot tether them for periods exceeding 15 minutes, 4 times daily. Dog owners who violate this ordinance may receive stiff fines.

The bad news is that the hunters lawyered up, threatened to sue, and got their dogs exempted from the protections of the ordinance.

It was obvious from Kanawha County Commission President, Kent Carper’s, introductory remarks at the public hearing that the fix was in and that the commission was going to grant the hunters’ demand to exempt their dogs from the protections afforded other dogs and that the Kanawha Humane Society’s board, many of whom were in the room, had already agreed to the exemption.

Had the commission not allowed public comment, one would have gotten the impression that there were only two “sides” to the argument. On one side were the hunters who lawyered up and threatened legal challenges to the law. On the other “side” was the Humane Society board that caved in to the hunters’ demands and agreed to exclude “hunting dogs” from the protections of the anti-tethering law.

I would like to remind commissioners Carper, Hardy and Shores that Kanawha County taxpayers have never granted the Kanawha Humane Society board plenary and plenipotentiary powers to speak and decide for the rest of us yet Carper conducted the public hearing as if all that mattered was that the lawyer-rich hunters and the Humane Society board had reached an agreement and that the hunters promised not to be cruel to their dogs.

I believe Kent Carper when he says that if hunters are caught being cruel to their dogs they will be prosecuted – with or without the anti-tethering ordinance - but animal cruelty is hard to “prove” in a court of law so those of us who wish to report cruelty need as much legal specificity and inclusion as we can get. Laws that don’t define cruelty don’t really protect animals. An animal can be starved, beaten or deprived of water and shelter for days before humane officers can “prove” that cruelty took place. Laws that clearly spell out how long you can tether an animal, how often you have to provide water for your animal and what, exactly, constitutes shelter for an animal make the cruelty easier to observe and document. Those of us who have reported animal abuse know that vague, “I’ll know it when I see it” animal cruelty laws favor the abuser. That, Mr. Carper, is why observers and enforcers need specific, black and white, binary laws. You either provided your dog with legally-defined shelter or you didn’t. You either provided your dog with sufficient food and water as defined by law, or you didn’t.

And, Mr. Carper, the reason tethering and confinement laws, in particular, are so fundamental to prevention of cruelty to animals is because, unlike wild animals, tethered animals and confined animals can’t go somewhere in search of food, water, shelter or warmth. A “stray” cat can crawl up inside a car’s engine compartment to get warm. A tethered dog can’t. A wild squirrel or raccoon can seek shelter from the rain, water for its thirst or food for its hunger. A tethered dog can’t. A starving, dehydrated, shivering dog tethered to a stake in the ground is worse off than a stray dog because at least a stray dog might get lucky and be taken in by a loving human. When I was a teenager, a neglected neighborhood dog adopted my family. We had already taken him in as a stray before we learned from the mail man that our new pet was, in fact, a refugee from down the street who escaped from his abusers and found a better deal, an option the tethered dog doesn’t have.

I believe Mr. Carper is a fine public servant and, as I told some Huntington animal rights activists yesterday, I wish Kanawha County, West Virginia and the nation had thousands more progressive, fair and decent public servants just like him, but the next time Mr. Carper is tempted to broker a backroom deal concerning Kanawha County's animal protection laws, I hope he will remember that hunters and Humane Society board members aren't the only Kanawha County taxpayers with an interest in protecting animals.

My biggest take aways from yesterday's public hearing:

1. If you lawyer up and threaten to sue, the Kanawha Humane Society will back down. Kanawha County's dogs are lucky the hunter didn't demand that all dogs be exempted from the tethering ordinance.

2. People who want stronger, more meaningful and enforceable animal protection laws need to be prepared to hire lawyers because the "other side" will.

3. People who want stronger, more meaningful and enforceable animal protection laws need to be better organized, need to communicate with each other more and need to get a lot better at recruitment, at PR and at using social media.

There’s a great deal more I’d like to say about that public hearing and about animal protection laws but I’ll save some of my comments for another day. Huntington’s city council recently passed an anti-tethering ordinance and soon, I’m told, the same animal activists who demanded the city ordinance will ask the Cabell County Commission to pass a county-wide ordinance so I’m sure I’ll have more to say then.

Next Meeting of The Charleston, WV, Chapter of Drinking Liberally

If you are a liberal and you’d like to meet and network with other liberals, come join us at 5:30 PM, Thursday, 7 January at Bruno’s, 222 Leon Sullivan Way.