I have not seen any claim that PETCO supports AB1634 at all, and I’ve been following this issue closely since AB1634 was introduced a year ago.

PETCO has appeared every year for many years as a supporter of the annual Spay Day event in Los Angeles. This year, the city government hijacked this non-political and non-controversial event to have a signing ceremony for their MSN ordinance.

Because PETCO was at the Spay Day event where the LA MSN ordinance was signed, they have been mis-represented in the news media and by some Los Angeles city officials as a supporter of the Los Angeles MSN ordinance. PETCO has answered numerous customer complaints with a reply that they do not support the ordinance and did not participate in the signing ceremony. PETCO says they don’t take sides on legislation, but rather leave that sort of thing to the pet industry trade group they are a member of, PIJAC.

PIJAC formally opposes AB1634. However, they’ve been reluctant to get actively involved in the fight. PIJAC’s Alerts on AB1634 are quite revealing about the pressures they face:
http://www.pijac.org/files/pub....._Alert.pdf
http://www.pijac.org/files/pub....._Final.pdf

That PETCO has been declared a supporter of the LA MSN ordinance is one of many lies from the Animal Rights extremists who sponsor AB1634 and the LA MSN ordinance. Let’s not fall for their dirty tricks.

It gets worse. During the public hearing before the Los Angeles City Council, prominent supporters of the MSN ordinance said that the CVMA and AVMA supported the ordinance. The Big Lie is standard operating procedure for the people peddling fascist AR legislation.

I am disappointed that PETCO has not AFAIK publicly disputed the widespread claims that they support the LA MSN ordinance. A press release and a prominent announcement on their website would go a long way toward countering these claims.

“prevent the sale of puppies unless from a government approved breeder”

Well, considering that our various governmental bodies are infamous for not even being capable of enforcing leash laws but pretty good at sending soldiers overseas to die on bogus military information, I’m not sure I’d be willing to trust the government to be the ones to decide what constitutes a “pre-breeding approval”.

“After reviewing the proposed law, it appears, based upon a general overview, to be unconstitutional on two basic principles, First, it is a taking of a property right without just compensation by a governmental agency.”

Of course, the AR (animal rights) people are trying to get around THAT by seeking to have “pet owners” redefined as “pet guardians”.

Yet another reason to oppose any movement by a legislative body to remove our right to OWN our pets.

Bravo, well said!
A woman I know breeds from her Border Collie bitch not because she makes any money out of the puppies, (or so she says) but because her bitch likes having puppies. The reasons people give for irresponsible breeding are ludicrous including, “I let my dog have puppies to stop her getting cancer” Instead of crazy laws implimenting the castration/spaying of dogs which is against the Animal Welfarm Act that has been adopted by many countries worldwide, regulate dog breeding, prevent the sale of puppies unless from a government approved breeder and just stop everybody allowing their dogs to breed. Surgical castration is NOT the answer, educating the dog owner is!!!
Regards, puppy paws

The bill itself is, as Mr. Ramirez aptly puts, unconstitutional. That’s the first reason.

The exemptions in the bill are impossible to achieve, according to the experts in the specific fields for those exemptions. That’s the second reason.

There is no mention for herding and farm/ranch dogs. That’s the third reason.

The bill places far too much discretion into local ACO hands, and gives them the ability to categorically deny intact permits even if the owner meets the exemption requirements by some miracle. That’s the fourth reason.

The bill creates not a uniform set of laws throughout the state, but a patchwork of local rules and discretionary judgements that can vary and cuase an owner to be in compliance in one county but not in the next. That’s the fifth reason.

The bill has the fines funding the enforcement of the law, which means a ethical conflict of interest for ACOs and a potential witch-hunt for dogs to add to the fines coffers. That’s the sixth reason.

The medical problems that come from premature spay/neuter are well documented, and have been mentioned in this thread, so I won’t bother to repeat them. That’s the seventh reason.

The permits expire on 1-1-2009 and the bill does not allow for any permits beyond that date, meaning no exemptions and all pets are altered. That’s the eighth reason.

The current (as of this posting) lack of any grace period on the violations creates instant fines that can put breed rescue organizations (such as those who rescued my retired racers) out of business, and create instant fines for those who applay for a permit and are turned down. That’s the ninth reason.

Current leash and license enforcement is about 14% in my county. If the current laws were already enforced properly, AB 1634 would be unnecessary. That’s the tenth reason.

And that doesn’t even begin to cover the lack of due process for violations…

I have had to euthanize four greyhounds in the past year. All of them were wanted and loved but their health failed them: Saturn from kidney and thyroid failure, Slim from hemaginosacoma, Bluebird from osteosarcoma (my heart hound), and Mustang, a Katrina survivor, from multiple strokes from chemical toxicity and brain damage from Katrina. All of them were age 11 or older, all of them had full lives, in the cases of Slim and Mustang, multiple chances, and I had to make the difficult call. I know what it’s like to love a dog and lose them. I know the emotion, I know the pain, I know the tears. I also know the rewards of owning them, too. And I know that AB 1634 will add to that, not cut it down. Reducing unwanted pet deaths by reducing all pet births is not the answer. The extremists at PETA and HSUS, I feel sorry for them, because they just don’t understand and never will, not the way we do. Someone higher up in the comments got it right on when they said the problem was people and not pets. AB 1634 punishes the pets, not the people.

As as for those other exemptions, they are ill-defined and up to local jurisdictions to call.

But the point remains: The bill does nothing to address the complex problems that go into getting fewer pets into shelters and keeping them into homes.