AFA legislation

Abstract

AFA members Tim Dahl, Ruth Hanessian and Lee Phillips spearheaded opposition to a resolution before the House Environment Matters Committee of the Maryland General Assembly which would have appointed a task force to "study the problems and special needs of exotic birds and animals living in this State, coming into this State, and being sold in this State; and requesting the task force to make recommendations and proposals to the General Assembly as to how to alleviate these problems and special needs". The proposed 15-member task force would have been heavily weighted against the keeping of birds and exotic animals, including representatives of two State agencies whose heads have publicly stated their opposition to keeping birds and pets, a representative of the poultry industry and its allied agency, the State Department of Agriculture, and only one representative of the pet industry and two citizen members.

The resolution made reference to "pre-

 

sent danger to citizens in the State as evidenced by 600 reported cases of exotic or wild animal bites per year".

The AFA members rallied support from the pet industry and pet owners and a contingent of over 20 people was present at the hearing to oppose the resolution. AFA members testified before the committee and presented a report from the State Department of Health that indicated only one of the reported 600 bites was from a pet bird, six from exotic animals and the remaining,593 from native wild animals and over 13,000 from dogs and cats. They also revealed there had been only 3 cases of psittacosis in the entire state in 1979; they also detailed quarantine procedures for legally imported birds.

Although the House Environmental Matters Committee reported the resolution unfavorably and thereby killed it, the Committee intends to study the matter in the corning year and introduce legislation next year which at the very lest would define "exotic animal".

 

PDF