A woman posted to one of the yahoo groups I belong to that a certain local establishment refused to serve her because she had her guide dog with her. The manager of that establishment apparently did not know about, and did not want to hear about, the Americans With Disabilities Act. He refused her service. When she left and decided to go to a local McDonald’s, the manager THERE gave her a hard time too, but relented.

I am constantly surprised when I hear about places large and small where the staff is apparently ignorant that disabled people with service dogs are allowed to bring their dogs in with them ANYWHERE THEY GO.

Let me repeat that. Service dogs are allowed to go anywhere their owners are allowed to go in public, including privately owned businesses that serve the public.

If you are a manager, franchise owner, or work in any public industry, please be aware that if you bar a disabled person from bringing their service dog into your place of business, you can be fined or even sued, as you just broke the law.

Some examples of places that service dogs are allowed:

• The grocery store
• Fast food restaurants such as McDonald’s or Burger King
• Fancy pants restaurants such as Tre La La
• The library
• Public transportation, such as buses, cabs, and trains
• Wal-Mart, Target, and Macy’s
• Hospitals and medical offices
• Movie theaters

If you frequent a business and you see a person with their service dog, you do not get to complain about, harass, or in any way interfere with the person or the dog. Don’t be an ass and complain that there is a dog in the restaurant. Your allergies or dislike of dogs are less important than someone being able to function safely in public.

If you work in retail or the food industry, or know anyone who does, please help get the word out about service dogs. Share this post liberally!

See also:
COMMONLY ASKED QUESTIONS ABOUT SERVICE ANIMALS IN PLACES OF BUSINESS
ADA Business BRIEF: Service Animals
ADA Handout pdf print version
Laws By State – states are allowed to have tougher laws than the federal version.

AP has posted an article, A new day for dogs: Pa. law targets puppy mills, detailing the new law meant to stop the horrors of unscrupulous commercial dog breeding (puppy mills).

From the article:

“The new law imposes strict standards on commercial kennels, including at least twice-a-year veterinary exams, larger cages and exercise requirements.”

I applaud their efforts, and I hope Iowa and the other puppy mill states follow suit with similar laws.

My worry is that despite the laws, unscrupulous commercial kennels will not change their ways. Let’s face it, it costs a lot more money to provide veterinary care, space, good food, exercise, and a clean environment for a large number of dogs. You have to pay more vet bills, and you have to pay more employees. You have to pay for lighting, air conditioning, and heating for the kennels. It’s going to cost a kennel money to bring up their care standard. Will the cost of violating the law be higher than the cost of complying with it?

Fines only punish a business if the amount they have to pay is greater than the amount they would pay for complying. A true punishment would be a 3 strikes variety — after 3 violations, they lose their license. PERMANENTLY. The article didn’t mention what the punishment is for violations, but if it’s the usual fines, it’s not going to be harsh enough.

Also, where will they get the people to enforce the law? Will they have twice yearly inspections of every licensed kennel in the state? All (according to the article) 2600 of them? There are around 260 working days in the year for a typical Monday-Friday job. How could they possibly manage that many inspections? On whose tax dollar? No, I’m betting they will rely heavily on complaints and required paperwork submissions. Any idiot can hire an unethical veterinarian who is short on cash to that for them.

Having the law is certainly a step forward, but puppy mills will never cease to exist until people stop buying their puppies. Please support your local ethical breeder. Don’t buy a dog from a pet store. Your dog will live for 8, 10, even 15 years or more. You don’t want a ton of health and behavioral problems to have to contend with. Choose your breeder carefully.

What do you think? Will the new law make any difference? Is it worth taxpayer cash to stop puppymills, or should we concentrate on educating the public and let the free market put an end to it?  Share your thoughts in the comments.

I just read another article on a proposed beach ban on dogs. The biggest reason? People not picking up after their dogs. Around here, picking up after your dog in public is the law. Like many municipal laws, it’s often ignored when it becomes inconvenient.

Picking up after your dog IS inconvenient. After all, the astounding lack of a place to put it after you pick it up forces you to carry around a stinky mess. Is that the price we pay for walking our dogs? Absolutely. Could it be easier? Absolutely. I purposefully walk my dog where I know there are trash cans or dumpsters along the route so I’m not stuck carrying the bag all the way home.

Do you know where there are a lot of dogs, yet no dog feces to be seen? My local forest preserve. You see, they provide pick up bags and GARBAGE CANS. There are garbage cans all over the place. You never have to go too far to find one. Not only does this mean you can ditch the poop, you can also ditch any other trash you have. There is no litter there, either.

Our preserve is groomed, meaning the gravel trails are kept up and the grass next to them is cut back. Someone is already patrolling the area, so having them empty the cans is not difficult.

Do you know where there are a lot of dog feces, soda cans, water bottles, and plenty of other nasty litter, trash, and unmentionables? The big county forest preserve, where there are no trash cans at all other than the ones at the entrance.

It’s not rocket science. The more convenient you make it, the more likely they are to do it. If you want people to clean up after themselves and their pets, be it dog feces, soda cans, or other litter, provide them plenty of garbage cans along the way.

A Los Angeles area woman with Special Needs was asked to leave a WalMart store because her Service Dog is a Pitbull.

http://www.chloethepitbull.com/

Please help end the ignorance. Visit the site and follow the links at the site to let WalMart know how ignorant they are.

We need more Pits and Rotties in the Service Dog industry to prove to people how great our dogs are. Please support Chloe — the more our dogs are used in this manner so the public can see them, the less the ignorant people who use them to fight will get all the attention. Visibility is everything. If the only stories people see are the bad ones, that’s all they think of our breeds. Please get the word out about this lovely service dog who is being discriminated against simply because bad people use other dogs of her breed to do bad things.

BSL is Bullshit

As you may know, I have a Rottweiler puppy. She’s currently 7 and a half months old. I would like her to be a friendly, outgoing, sweet, trusting, and obedient animal. My goal is to get her a CGC (Canine Good Citizen) by the time she’s 24 months old.
Possible agility or therapy dog work is in her future, depending on what she enjoys.
She loves people and fears few things. I’d like her to fear nothing, but that requires exposing her to every possible thing in positive ways so she knows she is safe with me always.

Hence my little issue.
I try to take her everywhere I can to expose her to new people, new dogs, new scents, and all that jazz. I want her to meet children of all ages, people with disabilities, people of different races, and all sorts of animals.
Yet I find more and more that dogs aren’t allowed in many public places, such as parks, nature trails, outdoor malls, and the like. Now, I’m not talking playgrounds here. I’m talking about a nice little lake with a trail that loops around it (Arlington Heights, Illinois, and Lake Geneva, Wisconsin) with big signs that say ‘No Dogs Allowed In Park’. Or my local strip mall.

Dog training classes don’t include things like people in wheelchairs, people walking with canes, women with screaming toddlers, and the like. I live in the suburbs, so exposing her to these things means I go to the mall or other busy spot, as she won’t see them on her daily walks.

So, what it all boils down to, to me, is a catch-22. Laws are being enacted all over about “dangerous dogs” and dogs are being disallowed from places because their handlers can’t or won’t control them (or won’t pick up their waste), yet in order for a dog to NOT be a nuisance it must be trained in the very locations from which it is being banned.
If my dog never sees a person in a wheelchair, she may fear it later. If she never sees children running and screaming during an excited game of tag, she may misinterpret what is going on.
If all of a sudden I move to the city, and she sees things that scare her, she may react in a negative way towards those things. That’s just part of being a dog, no matter the breed. Flight or fight.

A dog that is not exposed to things often fears those things. Responsible dog owners train their dogs, and we need places to take our dogs where we can expose them to things they don’t see at home. Having to leave the dog at home in the yard helps no one and often results in dogs that jump fences and maul perceived threats.

Sure, I drive all over to expose my dog to things since I can’t take her to the local mall or park, but it scares me when I think of all my neighbors with dogs who don’t have the time to do that. Or worse, don’t realize that their dog that behaves so well on its little walks at home might flip out at everything new when they move.

I hate it when irresponsible people ruin it for the rest of us.