Pit bull calls prove costly for London
Home sweet home!???? London, Ontario is home to the anti Pit bull city and they are calling it a crunch to them. Have they no idea what reposible Pit bull owners are going through financially and emotionally? But what we feel has little interest to City Hall.
Their first approach was to collect all the revenue from the reposible bullie owners until we showed how unjust that was, especially since it wasn't us creating the problem just because of the breeds we had.
Michael Bryant got on TV and asked the Ontario public to call ACC when they saw a Pit bull unleashed and unmuzzled. Naturally the majority of the public had no idea what a Pit bull even looked like, so they were called in for Boxers, Jack Russel Terriers, etc. Each call had to have a response regardless if it was mistaken identity and that costs time and money.
The Province that made the law left the budget to be put in the hands of each manicipality. It was for them to decide how they were going to enforse the law and incorporate it into the cities bylaws as well.
Everyone was fully aware of how dramitically costly this was going to be. So why is London whining now?
We spoke in City Hall that it was the irresponsible owners they would be having the problems with and that should have been addresses rather than making licenced and tagged animals fees go up already and we're abiding to that. They are well aware of it too as they see us each year in person at ACC along with all our documentations of our dogs and us.
Their problem is they are not getting revenue from those breaking the law and not registring their dogs and that's got nothing to do with us. There is a city bylaw here that says ALL dogs must be leashed in public unless in a Leash Free Park when off private property. All eyes are on the Pit bulls and MANY owners of other breeds are not abiding by the bylaw and ACC is doing nothing about it. It's only the bullie owners and look a likes that seem to 'have' to follow bylaws to a T!
Pit bull calls prove costly for London
Thu, July 12, 2007
By JOE BELANGER, SUN MEDIA
Pit bulls, banned in Ontario since 2005, are taking a huge bite out of London's animal- control budget.
The squat, muscular dogs make up about four per cent of the city's 25,000 licensed dogs, but chew up a quarter of the time spent on animal control.
And costs linked to handling pit bulls are running about $170,000, or 10 per cent of the animal-control budget.
"It's truly amazing what's happened since 2005," Jay Stanford, the city's manager of environmental services, told board of control yesterday.
"Pit bulls have basically dominated animal-control services. We're averaging 10 service calls a day and another 10 inquiries."
Stanford was reacting to questions by Controller Gina Barber about costs related to pit bulls under a new, five-year contract with London Animal Care and Control.
"The reason I'm concerned is nowhere do I see what the size of the problem is," said Barber.
"We're being asked to approve a contract now and get the facts later. That's backwards.
"And I have difficulty seeing growth in the number of pit bulls. We're going to see a diminishing problem over time."
Stanford said he's preparing a report on pit bulls for next month but promised more information in support of the contract before Monday's city council meeting.
Later, he said there are an estimated 100 unlicensed pit bulls in the city and upwards of 300 more that may be illegal.
Ontario banned the powerful dogs after a rash of headline-grabbing attacks on other dogs and humans, only sparing those born beforehand but subjecting them to new curbs.
Stanford said one ticket is issued every two days related to pit bulls but that many related complaints actually involve other dog breeds.
"People are spotting animals that are not necessarily pit bulls," he said.
"We're getting more calls, hearing more concerns because they are a target breed," he said of pit bulls.
"And when pit bulls make the news, it brings additional awareness and concerns. So the problem is going to be with us for a number of years yet."
The board is recommending approval of the new contract, lauded by animal welfare advocates for changes in how the city would handle strays:
Among the changes:
- Specified standard operating procedures, now lacking.
- Enforcement decisions left to the city, which would get all licensing and fee renewal revenue. The existing contract left those decisions to London Animal Care and Control and gave it half the money.
- Require residents to turn in found stray cats or dogs rather than have them collected by the company, resulting in fewer impounded cats.
- Focus more resources to spay and neuter pets.
2 comments:
I guess it keeps the darker side of humanity in plain sight doesn't it? There's the general lack of responsibility on the provincial governments behalf because of their half-baked financing scheme.. Then there's the disgruntled (and mostly ignorant) people who report "pit bulls" who aren't really "pit bulls" giving everyone a headache... And then there's the city who obviously didn't think far enough ahead as to how they were going to deal with the "pit bull" problem and are now trying to throw blame everywhere else.
Summation? Seems a lot of people have become emotionally callous to the plight of their neighbors (unless, heaven forbid, it is something TRULY TRAGIC like their dog or child being mauled) and are only looking out for number one. Lovely..
Can't wait until this law is overturned..
I spoke to someone yesterday that just got heavily fined for not having his bullie fixed. The dog was taken away and will be returned to him once the fine is paid.
I asked him how is it he was not aware of the provincial law, nor the London bylaws and he responded that he had had his dog legally grandfathered the year prior, but his friend who was caring for the dog, didn't know to license it properly.
This didn't make sense as if he had legally grandfathered his dog the year before, he would have had to go by all the requirements, which means microchipped, spay/nuetering, up-to-date rabies, frontal and profile pics, plus the filled in documents we received with info on us and our dogs with discriptions, date of birth, province of birth, etc.
I'm geninely curious how people with bullies are not aware of the laws and bylaws.
I understand that people that this does not apply to don't, but not bullie owners. It's in the press. We receive notification every year and as you know, each time there is an occurance, the provincial law is repeated over and over again.
This person sounded genine and not one of those that laugh at the law. He (I believe) truly thought his dog was legally grandfathered.
I spoke to another person quite awhile ago and he thought because his dog came with papers that he was excempt from the provincial laws. As much as I tried to explain that no bullie was exempt, he insisted that his mother had spoken to officials that said his dog was excempt.
There seems to be an awful lot of people who don't understand the Ontario law at all and are getting bogus information.
Confusing? Yes, I give them that, but I refuse to take any chances at the risk of my dogs life.
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