TACA's Positions on 2021 Proposed Legislation In general, TACA opposes unfunded mandates, is a proponent for local control, and feels we should be contacted to discuss any legislation that involves animals, Animal Control Officers, and/or animal shelters prior to it being filed. If you have any questions about these bills or TACA's position, please feel free to reach out to a Board Member or contact TACA's Legislative Chair. This page will be updated periodically as more bills are filed.
HB 337 – unfunded mandate, will essentially require private shelters to be subject to open records requests, forces public shelters to report monthly when some may do quarterly or annual reports
Oppose - this bill eliminates local control over the regulation of the possession or use of animals, including dangerous wild animals, simply because the owner claims they are "working animals"
Oppose - this is a best practice but many smaller shelters don’t even have scanners, TACA believes it would be better to start a program to provide them first
Oppose – unfunded mandate that would result in an increased workload by requiring a notice be sent to every adopter fifteen days before and after an "epizootic infectious disease" is diagnosed in an animal in the shelter and could lead to fewer adoptions if people mistakenly believe shelter pets are less healthy than those sold by breeders or pet stores
Oppose - this is an unfunded mandate that takes away local control over an animal issue - individual cities and counties are better able to determine appropriate regulations for their communities instead of having a one-size-fits-all law that will not be appropriate for all jurisdictions
Oppose – this is an unfunded mandate that would require notifications to owners if one "infectious" animal is in the shelter, even if the owned animal never comes in contact with the infectious animal, is not capable of being infected by the illness of the infectious animal, or how minor the affliction since "infectious disease" can include intestinal parasites or fleas – also, no definition of "quarantine" so some could argue it would mean the animal has to be kept in isolation completely away from other animals which is impossible in a shelter environment where space is a major limiting resource and would result in smaller shelters having to euthanize animals since they likely would have no place to quarantine animals
Oppose - unfunded mandate that will require agencies to allocate resources away from animal care so that they can create a report that has no value to animal control agencies as animal bite issues vary greatly across the state and what one jurisdiction has problems with, such as at-large dogs biting, does not affect others - additionally the information gathered could be used to support future breed specific legislation
Please contact the listed legislators to voice your opposition or support for these bills.