Fix the Laws that Fix Cats and Dogs

A few points made by veterinary medicine’s leading reproduction-oriented organization, the American College of Theriogenologists (ACT):

• (We) believe that companion animals who are not intended for breeding should be neutered.

• In these message points, the term “neutering” will be used to refer to both the spaying of female pets (ovariohysterectomy) and the neutering of male pets (castration).

• (We) also believe that the decision to spay or neuter is a decision that the pet owner and veterinarian should make on a case-by-case basis. In general, mandatory spay/neuter laws are not in the best interest of the pet or the owner.

• The benefits of neutering are well documented and include population control, decreased roaming, decreased aggression and decreased risks of mammary, ovarian and testicular cancers. As an example, spayed female pets are unlikely to develop mammary cancer, a common small-animal neoplasia. This cancer is malignant 60% of the time in dogs and 90% of the time in cats.

• Less well-known are the disadvantages of neutering surgeries. They include increased risk of obesity and diabetes, increased risk of certain cancers and endocrine disorders, and even increased incidence of hip dysplasia. Other research has shown that intact cats of both sexes experience a decrease in shyness when compared with neutered cats. Additionally, there appears to be a decreased incidence of cognitive dysfunction in intact dogs of both sexes.

• Mandatory spay/neuter programs (MSN), while well intentioned, are often responsible for decreases in licensing of animals and routine vaccinations in areas where MSN has been implemented.

• Owners of intact animals are less likely to seek veterinary assistance because of a fear of being reported to local authorities or a fear of fines associated with their intact animal. If owners avoid veterinary care, public health could be at risk due to decreased rabies vaccinations and routine prophylactic de-worming of our pets.

• Some pets may possess medical conditions that could result in complications during anesthesia or surgery. Therefore, a mandate of spaying or neutering, especially at a specific age, is not in the best interest of the pet. The pet overpopulation problem will not be resolved by mandating obligatory neutering of our pets. The problem is multi-factorial and must be attacked on a variety of levels.

Can a single female cat and her offspring really produce 420,000 cats over just seven years?

Hundreds of media reports have repeated that startling stat — in the past month alone, the number has appeared in the Dallas Morning News, the Tulsa World and the Times-Herald of Vallejo, Calif. It also turns up on many Web sites for animal advocacy groups who want to see more aggressive spaying and neutering, and urge people to adopt more cats.

I did some digging, and discovered that no one wanted to claim ownership of this stray stat.

The number is often attributed to the Humane Society of the United States, which lists it on a page of stats on the Humane Society Web site. But the group told me it’s not the source of the figure. “That number is flawed,” John Snyder, vice president of companion animals for the Humane Society, told me. “We no longer believe it.” He added, “I have no idea where that number came from.”

Does the 420,000 estimate sound reasonable to you? Should advocates use exaggerated numbers to advance a worthy cause?

Another prominent group, the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (which is unaffiliated with the Humane Society), has used the number in press releases and in a cat rescue program on the group’s Web site. Local SPCAs in Ontario, San Francisco and Bakersfield, Calif., also use the number.

An ASPCA spokeswoman told me the group got the stat from the Humane Society.

“I don’t necessarily believe it,” Stephen Zawistowski, ASPCA’s executive vice president, told me about the 420,000 number. He said it may belong in a category of “myths of the field,” including one that often turns up around this time of year: that for Halloween, witches adopt black cats from shelters and sacrifice them. (“If a lady with a broom and a black hat comes in, tell her to come back in a week,” Dr. Zawistowski advised.)

This is one feline number that has nine lives. Though no one I spoke to could say for sure where it comes from, and no one defended it, the myth of the precociously procreating cat has lived on as an advocacy tool for spaying cats for at least 18 years.

Often the number is preceded by that favorite word of hedgers everywhere: “theoretically.” As Gina Spadafori, a writer about animals who suggested this topic, wrote in an email, “With the word ‘theoretically’ thrown in there, the numbers *could* be true, I suppose.” But she was seeking a number that is “more likely — and more useful in terms of having real numbers to work with in developing public policy.”

Though no one has stood up to take credit for the number, it appears to be derived from assuming that each female cat survives into adulthood, and along the way begins reproducing herself at around six months, then continues creating litters every half year. That means 14 cycles of exponential growth over seven years.

While this, like just about anything, is theoretically possible, it’s highly improbable. “What that number does not take into account is that there are deaths — kitten mortality, in particular,” John New, professor of veterinary medicine at the University of Tennessee, told me. “Common sense would tell you, if [the stat] were true, we’d be up to our ears in cats.” (Just how many cats? I’ll get to that in a moment.)

In search of a more reliable number, I found that someone else had looked into the dubious cat stat. The Feral Cat Times, a newsletter of the Feral Cat Spay/Neuter Project in Seattle, published an article debunking the number in February, and instead proposed a number closer to 100. “It becomes overwhelming” to think that one missed cat could produce 420,000 offspring, Julie White, executive director of the project, told me. (Feral cats live in the wild, and can’t be domesticated.)

The Feral Cat Times cited research by Michael Stoskopf, professor of aquatic and wildlife medicine at North Carolina State, showing that three quarters of feral cats’ kittens in certain North Carolina colonies die before reaching reproductive age. Projected exponentially over 14 cycles of reproduction, that has a big impact on the numbers.

The newsletter called on mathematicians at the University of Washington to check the number. The conservative assumptions were that each female cat produced one litter of six cats each year, with three-quarters of them dying before reaching reproductive age and no more dying after reaching adulthood. The consensus: A real-world cat in the wild would likely be responsible for the creation of 98 other cats.

In an email to me, Jerry Folland — one of the mathematicians consulted by the newsletter — explained how he calculated that total (keep in mind that when you see fractions of cats, he isn’t slicing them up King Solomon-style, but instead is calculating what, on average, would happen in this hypothetical scenario):

There had better be a male cat around to help get the process started, and it’s easier if I include him in the calculation. So at the beginning there is one female cat and one male cat. In one year they produce six kittens, but three-fourths of them die, leaving 1.5 kittens, of whom half are female — so, 0.75 female kitten and 0.75 male kitten. At the end of the year they join the pool of adult cats, so at the beginning of the second year we have 1.75 female cats and 1.75 male cats. Each of the female cats produces another 0.75 (live) female kitten and 0.75 (live) male kitten for a total of 1.75*.75 female kittens and 1.75*.75 male kittens. At the end of the year they join the 1.75 adult females and 1.75 adult males, yielding 1.75 + 1.75*.75 = 1.75^2 adult females and likewise 1.75^2 adult males. (x^y means x to the y power.) The pattern continues: After seven years there are 1.75^7 female cats and 1.75^7 male cats. Now, 1.75^7 is a bit more than 50, so on rounding off, 50 females and 50 males. If you now remove the original male from the total, since he wasn’t explicitly mentioned in the problem, that leaves 50 + 49 = 99 cats.

When I told the Humane Society’s Mr. Snyder about this calculation, he said, “That seems low to me.” (Though he added that he plans to remove the 420,000 number from the group’s Web site.) One reason may be the assumption of one litter per year; make it two, and you’d be repeating the cycle 14 times, not seven times. 1.75^14 is a little over 2,500, so under this assumption, one cat could produce 5,000 cats in seven years — far more than 100, but a far cry from 420,000.

To get to 420,000 would require two litters a year from each cat, every year, and that 1.4 kittens survive each litter to live healthy (and productive) lives. (Dog owners, take note: A similar calculation for canines finds one female dog could, theoretically, produce 67,000 dogs in six years; this stat is also popular among animal advocates.)

The earliest reference I could find to the cat-reproduction figure was a 1988 article in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (citing the Humane Society). If you take a mythical cat beginning in that year, and let her and her offspring reproduce at the theoretical rate over the 18 years since, you’d have a cat population of nearly 50 trillion. That would mean the U.S. produces far more cats than coal: If each cat weighed, on average, five pounds, this catastrophically huge feline colony would weigh 120 billion tons — or about 100 times the amount of coal produced in the U.S. last year.

By comparison, there were about 70 million household cats in 2001, according to a survey of pet-owning households by the American Veterinary Medical Association. The Humane Society estimates there are 90 million pet cats and 70 million feral cats today.

Prof. New criticized the 420,000 number, but not its use by advocates. “If you can convince someone to spay one more cat, more power to them,” he said. Even if the number is wrong? “Well, I think it’s exaggerated, and that never happens in marketing,” he said, laughing.

The ASPCA’s Dr. Zawistowski told me that the number could make the challenge of fighting pet overpopulation seem overly daunting, even as there are indicators of success. In the 1930s, he said, more than 95% of cats and dogs brought into New York shelters were euthanized, compared with about 10% today. Yet “a lot of people say, pet overpopulation is getting worse and worse,” he said.

“A more realistic number will certainly be more useful for the animal-control agencies and humane organizations addressing these problems, as they need to assess the potential impacts of different interventions, associated costs, etc.,” Felicia B. Nutter, a wildlife veterinarian who studied feral cats under Prof. Stoskopf, told me in an email. “The big question is: What’s going to get the message across to the people who create the problem by not spaying and neutering their pets? I don’t have the answer to that one, but sure wish I did.”

ScienceDaily (May 1, 2009) — Many dogs are put down or abandoned due to their violent nature, but contrary to popular belief, breed has little to do with a dog’s aggressive behaviour compared to all the owner-dependant factors. This is shown in a new study from the University of Córdoba, which includes breeds that are considered aggressive by nature, such as the Rottweiler or the Pit Bull.

The conclusions, however, are surprising: it is the owners who are primarily responsible for attacks due to dominance or competition of their pets. 

The research team from the University of Córdoba (UCO) has determined a series of external factors which are inherent to the dogs in order to understand their aggressiveness, and they have observed that external, modifiable and owner-dependent factors have a greater influence on the animals. 

According to Joaquín Pérez-Guisado, the main author of the study and a researcher from the UCO, some of the factors that cause aggressiveness in dogs are: first-time dog ownership; failure to subject the dog to basic obedience training; spoiling or pampering the dog; not using physical punishment when it is required; buying a dog as a present, as a guard dog or on impulse; spaying female dogs; leaving the dog with a constant supply of food, or spending very little time with the dog in general and on its walks.

“Failure to observe all of these modifiable factors will encourage this type of aggressiveness and would conform to what we would colloquially call ‘giving our dog a bad education’”, Pérez-Guisado explains. 

The study, which has recently been published in the Journal of Animal and Veterinary Advances, is based on the following fact: approximately 40% of dominance aggression in dogs is associated with a lack of authority on the part of the owners who have never performed basic obedience training with their pets or who have only carried out the bare minimum of training. 

Breed has less influence on aggressiveness

The Spanish researchers studied 711 dogs (354 males and 357 females) of which 594 were purebred and 117 were half-breed dogs older than one year of age. Among the breeds observed were the Bull Terrier, the American Pit Bull Terrier, the Alsatian, the Boxer, the Rottweiler, the Doberman, as well as apparently more docile breeds such as the Dalmatian, the Irish Setter, the Golden Retriever, the Labrador Retriever, the Miniature Poodle, the Chihuahua, the Pekinese, and the French Bulldog, which also exhibit dominant behavior. 

According to Pérez-Guisado, certain breeds, male sex, a small size, or an age of between 5-7 years old are “the dog-dependent factors associated with greater dominance aggression”. Nevertheless, these factors have “minimal effect” on whether the dog behaves aggressively. Factors linked to the owner’s actions are more influential.

Let’s take a quick poll.

Consider all your family, friends and neighbors…

How many have a cat?  A dog?  How many are multi-pet families?

Quite a few.  In fact, according to the American Pet Products Manufacturers Association 2009-2010 National Pet Owners Survey, about 2 out of 5 households own a dog or a cat.  In dog homes, 36% have more than one dog.  In cat homes, 56% have more than one cat.

The pertinent question is: 

How many of your friends, neighbors or members of your family introduced a litter of pups or kittens to Fort Smith last year?

Didn’t think so.

How about in the last year?

Didn’t think so either.

The truth is …mostly feral, wild, and stray cats are over-breeding. Dogs and domestic cats are not over-bred.  Mandatory laws have virtually little or no impact on dog and domestic cat populations.  The truth is…perceived behavioral problems, old and sick, and ill-prepared first time pet owners surrender their animals to the humane society.  The solution rests in pet home retention, not mandates.

Twenty members of the Fort Smith Veterinary Medical Association signed a letter opposing the proposed mandatory spay/neuter and licensing ordinance recently voted on by the Fort Smith Board of Directors.  The letter was read aloud by Chris Ashworth during the April 5 City of Fort Smith Board of Directors meeting.

The text of the letter reads:

April 1, 2011

Dear Board of Directors, City of Fort Smith:

There is no question that any person with a passion for animals
would like to see less senseless euthanasia for unwanted dogs,
cats, puppies and kittens.  Unfortunately, the ordinance
currently proposed is unlikely to attain that goal.

This ordinance was supposedly put together after a year of
research.  However, no licensed veterinarian in Fort Smith
was contacted for his or her input on this topic.  All
area veterinarians STRONGLY supports spay and neuter as the
way to prevent unwanted animals.  This ordinance was never
presented to the Fort Smith Veterinary Medical
Association, and thus does not have it's backing as it is
currently proposed.

Spay, neuter, and euthanasia are emotional topics for all
animal lovers.  This ordinance, as written, fails to adequately
address all of the issues that can arise from mandatory spay/neuter
laws and licensing.  The data from other areas of the country that
have tried mandatory spay/neuter programs shows overwhelmingly
that these programs fail.  There is a reason that groups such
as the American Veterinary Medical Association is against
mandatory spay and neuter.  Additionally, the ASPCA, in its
"Position Statement on Mandatory Spay/Neuter Laws" says that
voluntary sterilization of owned pets is the only method of
population control that has demonstrated long-term effect in
reducing numbers of animals entering shelters.  Yet, the ASPCA is
not aware of any credible evidence that mandatory spay/neuter has
led to a statistically significant reduction in these numbers.

The idea of improved animal control, fewer strays, a decrease in
shelter animals, and a resultant decrease in euthanasia of all
animals are appealing.  The Sebastian County Humane Society
has reported a decrease in euthanasia over the past few years
even without mandatory spay/neuter laws.

What we are asking, is that the ordinance AS WRITTEN be tabled
pending further investigation and input from other sources.
One possible suggestion would be to form a committee of people
(possible including lay people and veterinarians) to further
review data.  This group could take time to look at all aspects
(scientific, emotional, and financial) or similar ordinances and
present an updated and improved version in a designated time period.

Euthanasia in our own city shelter is on the decline without mandatory
spay/neuter laws.  There is no rush to pass an ordinance that
inadequately addresses all aspects of the issue that it is designed to
correct.  

Please take time to further review this issue.

Thank you for your time and consideration.

Sincerely,

Cheryl Adkins DVM
Amanda Barnett DVM
David M. Blount DVM
P. J.  Broadfoot DVM
Philip Brunck DVM
James Butler DVM
Mark W. Davenport DVM
Jerrod English DVM
Lena France DVM
Rusty Henderson DVM
Rick Hittner DVM
R.L. Hubbs DVM
Kyle Ledford DVM
Laura M. Lynch DVM
Dorothy Preston DVM
Melanie Prewett DVM
Gwen Reeder Ray DVM
Jon C. Remer DVM
Mark Sharp DVM
Nicole L. Stec DVM

Click here for a copy of the letter in PDF format.

Across the country, shelters and rescue groups are putting together a new generation of “no more homeless pets” programs. Often these homegrown initiatives take fresh and innovative approaches, uniquely designed to address local problems and take advantage of local resources. The most successful initiatives, however, include five related parts, each of which reinforces and increases the effectiveness of the others:

1. Up-To-Date Information

The most effective programs are developed through a community needs assessment that gives advocates a composite snapshot of the animals who enter shelters in their area and tells how they have become homeless in the first place. Then advocates identify and mobilize resources to develop programs that address these needs, taking into account the lessons of history and effective programs that have been developed by colleagues in other parts of the country. These data-driven programs accomplish their goals at a minimum cost, making it easier to secure public and private funding.

2. Targeted Programs

Thirty years ago, when one household cat and dog in five was put to death in a shelter every year, almost anything advocates could do would help. And it did. The death rate has dropped to one in twenty. Now programs need to effectively target the remaining sources of shelter overpopulation to make more progress. With pet sterilization programs, for instance, programs need to increase the sterilization rates of the three major remaining populations of intact animals: cats and dogs living in low-income households, those who enter shelters and free-roaming cats. Targeting sterilization programs to these groups makes them cost-effective and helps secure broad support from the veterinary community.

3. Community Coalitions

It’s been said that those who forget history are condemned to repeat it. We’ve learned from a century of work that no single group can end the killing of homeless animals by itself. It takes a village. That’s because prevention is the key to ending companion animal homelessness and preventive programs have to be deeply rooted in the community to succeed. Broad coalitions like No More Homeless Pets in Utah allow advocates to develop proactive programs in their own hometowns, where the battle to end the killing is won or lost.

4. A Strategic Alliance With Veterinarians

Veterinarians are ideally situated to deliver the preventive services needed to end shelter overpopulation, from spay/neuter services and education, to pet behavioral counseling and microchipping. Also advocates are breaking new ground in several parts of the country with formal “Adopt a Pet from a Vet” programs. All of this has been made possible by the collaborative approach initiated by Maddies’ Fund in forming strategic alliances with veterinary groups. These alliances are not only critical to winning today’s fight against overpopulation, they are the key to our lifelong mission of improving the lives of companion animals.

5. Public Funding

Only ten years ago, public funding for animal programs was usually spent just on reactive “impound and kill” animal control programs left over from the past century. Now more than two dozen cities and states also earmark funds for neutering assistance programs. These programs can dramatically reduce the shelter death toll. State-funded neutering programs in New Hampshire have reduced the number of cats and dogs killed in shelters by 75% in seven years to the lowest statewide rate in the country. It all works together: Public funding allows programs to pay vets fairly, which encourages their broad participation. This makes them much more effective. And as a result they become a good investment of public funds. It’s the best of both worlds: they save lives and money.
Peter Marsh
Solutions to Overpopulation of Pets
24 Montgomery Street
Concord, N.H. 03301
January 4, 2003

On Tuesday April 5, the Fort Smith Board of Directors voted 4-3 to table the second reading of two animal control ordinances slated to take effect January 1, 2012.  One of the ordinances deals with updated definitions related to animal control code, while the more controversial requires all pets be licensed and spayed/neutered (unless an owner qualifies for and purchases a hobbyist license).  Before the second reading of the ordinances, Director Weber made a motion to table the second reading until May 17, to allow more time for further information to be presented to the board.  However, Director Catsavis made an alternate motion to table the reading for six months.  This motion passed 4-3 with Directors Settle, Catsavis, Hutchings and Good in favor and Directors Merry, Weber and Tyler in opposition.

Director Settle made a motion to allow members of the community present and signed up to speak to the issue to do so.  After the motion passed, the Board heard from several speakers, for and against the ordinances.  During this period, Dr. Chris Ashworth presented Board Members with a letter signed by twenty veterinarians from the Fort Smith Veterinary Medical Association, stating their opposition to the ordinances as written.

On Tuesday March 15, 2011, the City of Fort Smith, Arkansas Board of Directors voted to approve four new animal control ordinances.  The ordinances approved were:

• Ordinance essentially abolishing the tethering of a dog to a stationary object;
• Ordinance enacting a mandatory pet registration, spay and neuter regulations and hobbyist permit for dogs and cats;
• Ordinance creating the Animal Services Advisory Board;
• Ordinance establishing new definitions for the purpose of interpreting the new rules and regulations.

According to a memorandum by Police Chief Kevin Lindsey dated March 9, the intention of this ordinance is to “promote responsible pet ownership”.  In addition he states “Animals which have not been spayed or neutered and allowed to run at large present a risk to public safety and an unnecessary burden to the City of Fort Smith”.  There are leash laws in place that provide legal restrictions on those animals “allowed to run at large”.  Existing laws should be enforced instead of further laws being enacted. Before these policies are adopted and enacted by the City, there should be more input from local veterinarians, pet owners, dog breeders and hunters.

You will find links to the left where you can read more about the issue of mandatory spay neuter ordinances, including alternatives and evidence that such policies do not always meet stated goals and cost taxpayers more money than they save.

Consider the amazing results at the Nevada Humane Society in 2007 — all without mandatory spay/neuter ordinances!

The number of dogs and cats killed in Washoe County animal shelters declined by 51% for dogs and 52% for cats (compared to 2006).The save rate for dogs was 92% and 78% for cats and trending upward, despite a per capita intake rate that was over twice the national average and over three times that of many communities.

They found new homes for 7,452 homeless dogs and cats and 578 other animals.

The adoption rate increased 53% for dogs and over 84% for cats (compared to 2006).

The volunteer ranks increased from 30 to over 1,300 local citizens since expanding the volunteer program in March of 2007.

Here’s what they say about mandatory spay/neuter:

“Another mistake some people make is putting a lot of effort into mandatory spay/neuter legislation. While it can be a good idea to require shelters and pet stores to neuter all pets, the effort and energy that goes into passing legislation that focuses on individual pet owners can almost always be better spent ensuring that low-cost and free spay/neuter services are readily available and accessible to the people who need them most.”

For a complete review of how they turned their community “pet-centric” and their 10 point suggestions on how to create community endorsed solutions to move towards being a pet vibrant city, go to:

http://www.nevadahumanesociety.org/pdf/HowWeDidIt11-08.pdf

June 1, 2007

As a past president of the California Veterinary Medical Association, founder of the California Council of Companion Animal Advocates that sponsored biannual Pet Overpopulation Symposia (now the Animal Care Conference), member of the American Veterinary Medical Association Animal Welfare Committee and the National Council on Pet Population Study and Policy, author of the CVMA and AVMA positions on early spay/neuter, past chairman of the Orange County Animal Shelter Advisory Board, and recipient of the Hill’s Animal Welfare and Humane Ethics Award as well as being selected as an AAHA Regional Practitioner of the Year, I have devoted my professional life to trying to understand the many factors that contribute to the continuing problem of animal relinquishment and euthanasia. I, like most veterinarians, believe that spay/neuter is one of the most important parts of the solution to this national disgrace. Unfortunately, this divisive legislation will not help and may aggravate the situation for the following reasons:

It is inappropriate to mandate a controversial and possibly life threatening surgical procedure. It seems inappropriate for a profession to legislate a procedure that only they can provide. We all know that we lose money on spay/neuter procedures.

The number of animals being euthanized in California shelters has dropped steadily for more than two decades despite the continuous population increase in families with pets. Importantly, the numbers continue to drop faster in shelters that are in jurisdictions that do not have mandatory spay/neuter.

The majority of animals euthanized (approximately 60-70 percent in most shelters) are unowned or unwanted, stray and feral cats. This bill will not impact this population in any way.

There are so few puppies and small dogs in many shelters that they “import” them from other shelters in California, other states and/or foreign countries.

A large percentage of the dogs counted as euthanized are DOA, old, ill, injured, or behaviorally unacceptable. The actual numbers of these animals are unknown due to incomplete record keeping by the sheltering community.

The majority of dogs euthanized are medium to large mixed breed individuals (many of them pit bull crosses) belonging to irresponsible owners who are hard to identify and who will never comply with this law and are noncompliant with many other community laws.

The number of young, healthy, well socialized, adoptable animals euthanized is much smaller than the humane and sheltering community has claimed.

As it is agreed that breeders of pure bred dogs and cats are relatively small contributors to the shelter euthanasia numbers, why are they being required to fund the implementation of this law with fees (often quoted between $100 and $200 per year) to simply own an intact animal that may never be bred? Owners of intact animals are already paying a differential licensing fee. Why impose increased taxation on this law abiding community?

If passed this law will be very unfair to the economically disadvantaged. They are, as a community, poorly educated about pet population control, often culturally averse to neutering their pets, have the least ability to afford this surgery, have little access to low cost clinics in most communities and often do not have transportation. Although this community contributes disproportionately to the numbers of animals impounded, I don’t think there is any political will to deprive them of their pets. In order to have the desired effect, the law would require fines, sterilization at the owner’s or the public’s expense, or impoundment. No one wants to deny these families the benefits of animal companionship. And yet, if we fail to address this segment of society; how will this bill reduce shelter euthanasia?

If this bill is passed, it will fail to solve the euthanasia numbers because animal relinquishment is not a problem of too many dogs and cats but one of too few responsible owners. The steady decrease in animals being euthanized in shelters can be accelerated through cooperative effort among veterinarians, animal control agencies, humane activists and dog and cat breed clubs encouraging responsible ownership through enforcing regulations already in place, gathering more useful information in the shelters, designing more effective and better targeted educational materials and delivery systems, differential licensing fees, vaccinating and licensing cats, encouraging owners to keep cats indoors, encouraging spay/neuter of cats allowed outside, microchipping, and providing mobile low cost spay/neuter.

Even if it was possible to “turn off the faucet” there would be little reduction in the cost of shelter operation. As hospital owners know, most costs are fixed (facilities, administration, trucks, equipment, etc.) The shelter can’t even reduce staff as we can in private business. Unfortunately, a reduction in the numbers of animals entering the shelter will only effect a small reduction in the overall cost to the taxpayer. This is demonstrated by the steady increase in animal control budgets over the last two decades despite the number of animals entering the shelters and the number of animals euthanized decreasing significantly.

Reducing the number of pet animals born  will not reduce the demand for puppies and kittens. This reduction, particularly of well bred and socialized animals, will leave people vulnerable to puppy millers from other states, unregulated internet sales, sellers of animals smuggled across the border and unscrupulous brokers of animals imported from Eastern Europe and Latin America. If these animals are poor representatives of their breeds, poorly socialized or unhealthy-and they usually are; many will end up in the shelter. Isn’t it better to buy animals from people you can question face to face, premises you can inspect, and breeding stock you can see?

If low cost spay/neuter in the shelters is to be part of the solution, who will provide the service? The shelters have had difficulty filling their veterinary positions for years. If shelters decide, as has been suggested in San Diego, that technicians can bridge the short fall; we will, again, have to fight the battle about technicians being allowed to perform surgery. Do animals in the shelter deserve a lower standard of care than those taken to private veterinary hospitals?

Although the bill allows local jurisdictions to issue an intact animal permit for guide dogs, service dogs, signal dogs, and dogs used in law enforcement and for rescue activities; it does not allow for intact animal permits for those animals that are bred to produce these dogs. An unfortunate result of mandatory spay/neuter in many jurisdictions in California and around the nation is an initial increase in shelter euthanasia rates and decreased licensure, as people try to drop out of the system. This will decrease shelter revenues and may cause fewer animals to be vaccinated against rabies, possibly contributing to a public health problem. This is, quite possibly, why the Peninsula Humane Society is not a supporter of this bill.

As Hurricane Katrina and other disasters have demonstrated, it is important to know which families have pets. We need to encourage people to enter the system, not drive them away. Requiring veterinarians, as has been suggested in San Jose, to report the reproductive status of animals along with our rabies vaccinations reports, will result in some owners not seeking veterinary care for their animals. How will this serve animals or public health we are sworn to protect?

An unforeseen consequence of passage of this bill will be denial of Maddie’s Funds to any community in California. These funds, which are available for collaborative programs to achieve no kill status, are not available to any community with mandatory spay/neuter.

The CVMA has always been known as an organization that is science based, thorough, deliberate and open in its decision making. In this case the CVMA has let its membership, the people and the animals of California down. CVMA did not seek or ignored statistics about the problems associated with mandatory spay/neuter and seems unaware of readily available information about the factors contributing to animal relinquishment from sources like the National Council on Pet Population Study and Policy. To be successful in solving such a multifaceted problem, it is important to bring all contributing groups together. Instead of being the rational voice in this difficult arena, CVMA was swayed by the emotional cry, “we have to do something.” More important, this decision was made without the input of CVMA’s membership. CVMA has always used the governors, delegates and the California Veterinarian to poll its membership when making decisions of this magnitude. I know of no one in my district who was aware of your deliberations before this decision was made.

This proposal interferes with citizens’ rights, fails to address the major sources of animals entering shelters, punishes the law abiding and the poor, reduces the availability of good quality pets, leaves California’s citizens vulnerable in their search for family pets, and exacerbates the ill will among the groups that need to work together to develop workable strategies to reduce the number of unwanted dogs and cats euthanized in our shelters each year.

Ultimately, as past experience has shown, this coercive, punitive, intrusive law will retard the progress that has been made in the past two decades. CVMA can and should do better than this. Abandon this bill and provide the leadership necessary to bring everyone (veterinarians, humane activists, animal control agencies, dog and cat breeders, feral cat caretakers and other knowledgeable interested parties) together to develop effective ways to reduce the number of unwanted dogs and cats entering our shelters.

Sincerely,

John A. Hamil, DVM
Past President, CVMA