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Election 2005
For Immediate Release
February 4, 2006
General Assembly Bill Creates Electronic Data Base of State Dog and Cat Owners
The House Agriculture, Natural Resources and Chesapeake Committee on February 1, 2006 sent to the House floor HB339 "Licensing of dogs and cats." The requirement that every Virginia county and city charge the same, largely higher fees for animal licensing was stripped from the bill, but its basic mandated information-collecting mechanism was unchanged. A Virginia owner-pet database will be established and be available to commercial and all other interests under the Freedom of Information Act.
HB339 requires that every state veterinarian supply county and city treasurers with the names, addresses, animal description and breeding status of any dog or cat given a rabies vaccination. Treasurers are then required to send licensing bills to local owners and share information with other treasurers. All Virginia jurisdictions license dogs; eight of them license cats.
Bob Kane, president of the Virginia Hunting Dog Owners' Association expressed concerns with HB339, "Owners of unlicensed and unvaccinated dog and cats will continue to ignore those requirements. Animal owners wishing to remain out of this owner-pet database have an incentive to not get their animals vaccinated or obtain the shots in other states and not license here at all. None of us want our personal information given to junk mailers. But the more worrisome aspect of this data collection is that it could also be used harass people that activists decide have too many animals, the wrong breeds or should sterilize their pets. The only way to prevent that is to take steps to stay out of the new database."
"I'm surprised that the veterinarians supported this bill. I expect tag sales and rabies vaccinations will both drop, putting the public at increased health risk. County treasurers will forced to incur added expenses, setting up automated systems to advance private agendas, but their revenue is likely to fall as well."
HB339, for the first time in Virginia law, also requires that public monies collected by dog wardens be used for unspecified and possibly private spay-neuter programs. Additionally, the owner of any impounded intact dog or cat will pay an extra $5/day recovery or the animal will be sterilized. The bill is silent on who pays for that operation’s cost or what happens to animals abandoned or their owners because of that new requirement.
Kane concluded, "There are too many bills being hurried through Virginia’s short General Assembly sessions. This one’s a bad one and I’m grateful to those delegates who understood that and voted not to report it. Hopefully, enough others will join them and HB339 won’t become law."
For additional information, contact Bob Kane at 540-543-2312
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The Virginia Hunting Dog Owners' Association is a statewide volunteer group of sporting, hound and mixed breed dog owners dedicated to advancing and protecting the Old Dominion's hunting traditions. For more information about VHDOA, call (540) 543-2312 or visit http://vhdoa.uplandbirddog.com/index.html
February 4, 2006
General Assembly Bill Creates Electronic Data Base of State Dog and Cat Owners
The House Agriculture, Natural Resources and Chesapeake Committee on February 1, 2006 sent to the House floor HB339 "Licensing of dogs and cats." The requirement that every Virginia county and city charge the same, largely higher fees for animal licensing was stripped from the bill, but its basic mandated information-collecting mechanism was unchanged. A Virginia owner-pet database will be established and be available to commercial and all other interests under the Freedom of Information Act.
HB339 requires that every state veterinarian supply county and city treasurers with the names, addresses, animal description and breeding status of any dog or cat given a rabies vaccination. Treasurers are then required to send licensing bills to local owners and share information with other treasurers. All Virginia jurisdictions license dogs; eight of them license cats.
Bob Kane, president of the Virginia Hunting Dog Owners' Association expressed concerns with HB339, "Owners of unlicensed and unvaccinated dog and cats will continue to ignore those requirements. Animal owners wishing to remain out of this owner-pet database have an incentive to not get their animals vaccinated or obtain the shots in other states and not license here at all. None of us want our personal information given to junk mailers. But the more worrisome aspect of this data collection is that it could also be used harass people that activists decide have too many animals, the wrong breeds or should sterilize their pets. The only way to prevent that is to take steps to stay out of the new database."
"I'm surprised that the veterinarians supported this bill. I expect tag sales and rabies vaccinations will both drop, putting the public at increased health risk. County treasurers will forced to incur added expenses, setting up automated systems to advance private agendas, but their revenue is likely to fall as well."
HB339, for the first time in Virginia law, also requires that public monies collected by dog wardens be used for unspecified and possibly private spay-neuter programs. Additionally, the owner of any impounded intact dog or cat will pay an extra $5/day recovery or the animal will be sterilized. The bill is silent on who pays for that operation’s cost or what happens to animals abandoned or their owners because of that new requirement.
Kane concluded, "There are too many bills being hurried through Virginia’s short General Assembly sessions. This one’s a bad one and I’m grateful to those delegates who understood that and voted not to report it. Hopefully, enough others will join them and HB339 won’t become law."
For additional information, contact Bob Kane at 540-543-2312
~~~~~~~~~
The Virginia Hunting Dog Owners' Association is a statewide volunteer group of sporting, hound and mixed breed dog owners dedicated to advancing and protecting the Old Dominion's hunting traditions. For more information about VHDOA, call (540) 543-2312 or visit http://vhdoa.uplandbirddog.com/index.html
Copyright © 2006 VHDOA