Missouri Puppy Mill Legislation and Farmers Wake-up Call

What do puppy mills have to do with farmers?  Plenty, as evidenced by the recent campaigns to institute new puppy mill and commercial dog breeding laws in Missouri.  

My own rural Ozarks neighborhood was filled with campaign signs warning that the government would soon be telling you how many horses, cattle, hogs, and other livestock you may own and how they must be cared for.  You may recall my own remarks about Missouri's Prop B and farmers during the campaign.

Missouri puppy mill compromise legislation was passed and many Missouri commercial dog breeders have gone out of business.  At the same time, Missouri farmers are still angry and feeling very threatened.  So are livestock producers in other states.

I usually do not quote press releases in their entirety, however, this is important information that I want to make sure I get right.  The information below comes from "Mo. dog breeding vote 'wake-up call' for farmers" written by Alan Scher Zagier of the Associated Press.

A 2010 ballot initiative to toughen oversight of dog breeders highlighted the rift between Missouri farmers and national animal rights activists. Two years later, the divide has only deepened.

Twenty-five farm groups ranging from the Missouri Pork Association and the state Beef Industry Council to agribusiness heavyweights Cargill and Monsanto have united under the banner of Missouri Farmers Care.

Their target? The Humane Society of the United States, which pushed the dog breeding initiative and is now the primary financial backer of Your Vote Counts!, a proposed state constitutional amendment requiring a three-fourths majority vote before the Legislature could override voter-approved laws.

That's just what lawmakers did last year, reversing many of the new rules for dog breeders endorsed by a slight majority of Missouri residents just months earlier.

Farmers' anger was on full display at a recent Missouri Farmers Care meeting in Monroe City, 20 miles from the banks of the Mississippi River and half that distance from Mark Twain's birthplace in Florida, Mo.

Vehicles sported bumper stickers warning HSUS and People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals to "get your paws off our laws." Missouri Farmers Care flyers set on a table said, "Their goal is to end animal agriculture by increasing the cost of food and even through outright bans."

Activists view animals as "cuddly, furry things, not what we use to make money in livestock operations," said state Sen. Brian Munzlinger, a Republican whose district includes 13 northern Missouri counties dominated by hog farms and grain elevators.

"They weren't going to stop at pets," he added. "They're going after all of our farm animals."

Rural lawmakers such as Munzlinger have headlined a recent series of Missouri Farmers Care town hall meetings across the state. From Clinton and Harrisonville to Salem and St. Joseph, hundreds of farmers turn out twice a month for political rallies that bring together soybean growers, dairy producers and other agricultural groups that more often have focused on their own narrow interests, said Dan Kleinsorge, the farm group's operations manager.

"Prop B was a wake-up call for agriculture," he said.

Farm groups in other states also are heeding the call, Kleinsorge noted, as HSUS and other animal rights groups target not just Missouri but two dozen states that allow signature-driven petitions to appear on ballots.

In neighboring Nebraska, Gov. Dave Heineman caused a stir this month when he referred to HSUS in saying, "We're going to kick your ass and send you out of the state." Farm groups there have formed a "We Support Agriculture" coalition as a pre-emptive move against potential HSUS-supported ballot efforts.

In Ohio, the state Farm Bureau formed a Center for Food and Animal Issues as part of its successful push for a 2009 ballot measure that created a livestock care oversight board. And in Iowa, farm groups stung by the release of videos of chicks being ground up and pigs being beaten convinced lawmakers to make it a crime to lie on a job application to get access to farms to make secret recordings.

While the Your Vote Counts! effort makes no mention of agriculture or "cuddly, furry" pets, Missouri campaign finance reports show two-thirds of the more than $345,000 donated to the petition drive through the end of 2011 came from HSUS. Another $50,000 was donated by the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. Just two of the 11 individual donors to Your Vote Counts! in the fourth quarter of 2011 live in Missouri.

Missouri Farmers Care has raised significantly less — about $127,000 through 2011 — but nearly all its 290 individual donors in the last three months of 2011 were Missourians. Most gave in relatively small amounts.

Dane Waters, the Your Vote Counts! campaign manager, acknowledged HSUS is the primary force behind the proposed Missouri ballot measure. His group must still collect signatures from two-thirds of the state's congressional districts equaling at least 8 percent of the votes cast in the 2008 gubernatorial election. That amounts to between about 146,000 and 178,000 signatures — though the group is aiming for 234,000 names.

"With any initiative effort, there's always a primary supporter or a primary donor," said Waters, who worked on Sen. John McCain's 2008 presidential campaign and is also political director for the Humane Society Legislative Fund, an HSUS spinoff group that works to change state and federal animal protection laws.

"At the end of the day, it's irrelevant where the money comes from," he added. "Because only Missourians get to vote on it."

Waters agreed that the dog breeding initiative led to the latest fight, but he disputed the idea that his group was anti-agriculture. He said it has no plans, nor interest, in other agriculture-related political campaigns in Missouri beyond this year.

"There's a tremendous amount of misunderstanding about what HSUS is," he said. "Our goal is to not to fundamentally change the agricultural society in Missouri. Our goal is to work within the agricultural framework."

Farmers and their supporters remain suspicious. Steve Yates, a 59-year-old retired high school agriculture teacher who attended the Monroe City meeting, summed up the unease shared by many there.

"It threatens our livelihood, but it's a bigger issue," he said. "Whether you're a commodity producer or not, it affects the way we live. If you think the price of food is high now, just wait."

 

Puppy Mills: HSUS Investigation of NY Pet Stores Selling Puppies

MO Puppy Mill Photo from HSUS  

In anticipation of the busiest puppy-buying season of the year - the winter holidays - The Humane Society of the United States has revealed the results of its latest hidden-camera investigation; exposing more than 100 New York state pet stores that supply unsuspecting consumers with puppies from inhumane large-scale commercial breeders known as puppy mills. 

Many Web sites or employees of these stores imply or explicitly state that the puppies come only from small-scale “private breeders”—not from notorious puppy mills.

“These high-priced pet stores claim to sell dogs from small private breeders, but are actually pushing dogs from huge Midwest puppy mills with some of the worst federal Animal Welfare Act violations imaginable,” said Jonathan Lovvorn, senior vice president for investigations at The HSUS. “Consumers are being duped into buying puppies born to breeding dogs who spend their entire lives trapped in tiny wire cages, churning out litter after litter.”

An HSUS investigator, along with businessman Lorenzo Borghese from ABC’s “The Bachelor,” went undercover as “shoppers” and caught sales staff at 11 New York City-area pet stores making misleading claims concerning the origin of their puppies. Shipping documents were also obtained for more than 100 New York State pet stores. The investigation revealed:

• All 11 stores videotaped by HSUS investigators purchased their puppies from large-scale commercial breeding facilities, despite specific claims of “no puppy mills” or misleading statements implying that their sources were small “private breeders.” When HSUS investigators filmed some of these breeding facilities they found hundreds of dogs confined to small cages.
• More than 100 pet stores in New York that were investigated through a public records search were shown to have purchased more than 4,500 puppies from similar commercial large-scale breeding or brokering operations in Arkansas, Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri and Oklahoma during approximately a four-month period in 2011. More than 3,000 puppies were shipped to New York stores from Missouri alone during that period. Missouri is the puppy mill capital of America.
• All of the stores visited by investigators and many of the 100 stores whose puppy transport records were examined were found to be buying puppies from suppliers with known Animal Welfare Act violations, including some with citations for filthy conditions, lack of adequate space, underweight breeding animals, dogs found in the freezing cold or high heat without adequate weather protection, or sick or injured dogs in need of veterinary care.
• Some of the stores investigated (but none of the stores visited in person) were even found purchasing from an unlicensed, convicted animal abuser, Kathy Jo Bauck, aka Kathy Cole, whose USDA license was revoked after years of extreme state and federal animal care violations for issues such as dogs with open and bleeding wounds who had not been treated by a vet, piles of accumulated feces, and puppies found shivering in the cold in temperatures as low as 12 degrees F. Bauck was ordered to stop performing surgeries on dogs without a veterinary license in 2006, and convicted of animal cruelty and torture in 2009.
• Seven of the stores investigated by The HSUS were buying puppies from Brandi Cheney, who was identified in The HSUS’s Missouri‘s Dirty Dozen report last year as one of the worst puppy mill operators in Missouri. More than 500 pages of USDA inspection and enforcement reports on breeding facilities linked to Cheney reflect the facilities’ failure to provide vet care to sick and dying dogs, dogs subjected to below-freezing temperatures with inadequate shelter and dogs with such severe matting that the removal of the mats left oozing, open sores. Four additional puppy mills highlighted in the HSUS’ Missouri’s Dirty Dozen report were also found selling to New York pet stores.
• One salesman refused to give breeder information to the undercover shoppers, repeating three times, “I have nothing to hide.” The investigation found his store purchased puppies from Brandi Cheney.

 

Puppy Mill Facts:

• Dogs at puppy mills typically receive little to no medical care, live in squalid conditions with no exercise, socialization or human interaction and are confined inside cramped wire cages for life. For more information, see humanesociety.org/puppymills.
• Dogs from puppy mills are sold in pet stores, online and directly to consumers with little to no regard for the dog's health, genetic history or future welfare.
• The HSUS urges people who want to get a puppy to consider adopting from a shelter or rescue group first. If deciding to buy from a breeder, potential buyers should always visit the breeder in person to see that the dogs are treated humanely and ensure the puppies and their parents are living in spacious, clean areas. For more information, see humanesociety.org/puppy.

Puppy Mills: White House Petition Signatures Over 10,000

According to the Humane Society of the United States, in less than ten days since its filing, a petition submitted to the White House asking President Obama to crack down on puppy mills has gathered more than 10,600 signatures - doubling the threshold needed to assure an official response.

The Humane Society of the United States, the ASPCA, and the Humane Society Legislative Fund submitted this petition using a new feature on the White House website called "We the People," which allows individuals to seek federal action.  In turn, the White House promises a response to any petition gathering at least 5,000 signatures within 30 days.  The anti-puppy mill petition met the requirement in less than one week, and as of yesterday has received more than 10,600 signatures.  The petition is now the most popular animal related petition on the White House website, and one of the top 15 overall.

The US Department of Agriculture recently issued a proposed rule to prohibit the import of puppies younger than six months of age from foreign puppy mills for commercial resale in the United States, implementing a law passed by Congress in the 2008 Farm Bill.  This White House petition calls on that agency to close a loophole in the Animal Welfare Act which regulates large scale commercial dog breeders who sell puppies wholesale to brokers or pet stores, but provides no oversight or standards for those who sell directly to the public through newspaper ads or the Internet.

Additional signatures are still encouraged to allow the petition to reach the status of "most popular" on the White House website.  Those who wish to sign should go to:  wh.gov/gdb.

Puppy Mills: US Pet Stores Take Pledge

Thanks to the efforts of local advocates, 46 pet stores across the nation have recently signed The Humane Society of the United States' Puppy Friendly Pet Stores pledge — committing not to sell puppies, and instead support local animal adoption programs and provide literature that helps customers learn how to locate a reputable dog breeder. The HSUS applauds these retailers because their actions prove it is not necessary to support the cruel puppy mill trade to operate a successful pet-related business.

"These stores have set a positive example of corporate responsibility for other businesses to follow," said Melanie Kahn, senior director of the puppy mills campaign for The HSUS. "Pet stores that profit from the cruel puppy mill industry need to step up and do the right thing by stopping their puppy sales. I am thrilled to have wonderful local advocates working in our area to increase the public's awareness of puppy mills."

Store owners and managers who sign The HSUS' pledge receive a placard proclaiming, "We love puppies; that's why we don't sell them," to display in the store, as well as materials about adopting a dog or finding a responsible breeder. The HSUS encourages shoppers to purchase pet supplies at stores displaying the puppy-friendly sign.

The retailers that have recently signed the puppy friendly pledge to not sell puppies are:

• An-Jan Feed & Pet Supply (Calif.): locations in San Jose, Milpitas, and Morgan Hill.
• PET CLUB (Calif.): locations in Corte Madera, San Mateo, Hayward, Mountain View, Emeryville, South San Francisco, San Jose, Elk Grove, Fairfield, Santa Rosa.
• Centinela Feed & Pet Supplies (Calif.): locations in Burbank, Costa Mesa, Culver City, Encino, Long Beach, Los Angeles, Pasadena, Rancho Palos Verdes, Redondo Beach, Santa Monica, Torrance, Westchester, and West Los Angeles.
• Natural Pawz (Texas): locations in Houston, The Woodlands, Vintage Park, Sugar Land
• Woof Gang Bakery: locations in Naples, Fla., Celebration, Fla., Orlando, Fla., Sarasota, Fla., Windermere, Fla., Lutz, Fla., Austin, Texas, and Asheville, N.C. 

Policy Helps Dogs Across the United States

The majority of pet stores that sell puppies carry dogs from puppy mills, which are mass production facilities that churn out large numbers of puppies under inhumane conditions. The breeding dogs at puppy mills spend their entire lives in cramped cages or kennels with little or no personal attention or quality of life. Consumers who purchase puppies from pet stores or over the Internet without seeing a breeder's home firsthand are often unknowingly supporting this cruel puppy mill industry.

Facts:

• Approximately one-third of the nation's 9,000 independent pet stores sell puppies.
• The HSUS estimates that 2 million to 4 million puppy mill puppies are sold each year in the United States.
• Documented puppy mill conditions include over-breeding, inbreeding, minimal veterinary care, poor food and shelter, crowded cages and lack of socialization.
• Dogs kept for breeding in puppy mills suffer for years in continual confinement. They are bred as often as possible and then destroyed or discarded once they can no longer produce puppies.
• Pet stores and online sellers often use attractive Web sites to hide the truth and to dupe consumers into thinking that they are dealing with a small, reputable breeder.
• Reputable breeders never sell puppies over the Internet or through a pet store and will insist on meeting the family who will be purchasing the dog.
• Puppy mills contribute to the pet overpopulation problem, which results in millions of unwanted dogs euthanized at shelters every year.
• Over the past three years, 16 states have passed laws to crack down on puppy mills.

Winners of the 2011 HSUS Spay Day Pet Photo Contest

Pet lovers raised almost $340,000 to help fund spay and neuter efforts around the world in the recent Spay Day Photo Contest sponsored by the Humane Society of the United States.

Grand prize winner in the Fundraising Category: Matilda whose charity is Lost and Found Dog Rescue Adoption Center in New Castle, Delaware.

Matilda - photo courtesy HSUS

Winner in the Judged Category:  Jinjy a dog from Edwards, Colorado, whose favorite charity is any and all participating Spay Day organization.

Jinjy - photo courtesy HSUS