Ban Passes 5-1
Fayette, AL - Back in March, Christina Selman was terribly mauled by three of her neighbor's pit bulls. She had stepped between her daughter and one of the pit bulls after her daughter tried to pet it. The dogs immediately bit into her leg and pulled her to the ground. Fayette Police Chief Danny Jenkins said her injuries were unlike anything he had ever seen. This debilitating attack was the driving force behind Fayette's new ordinance to ban pit bulls.
The ordinance, passed 5-1, bans new pit bulls or dangerous dogs from living in the city limits and will require current owners to fulfill strict requirements, including structures to contain the dogs, liability insurance and registration for the animals before July 3. It also expands the dangerous dog rules already in place. "The ordinance we had in place was kind of toothless," Jenkins said. Jenkins also reiterated in the article a very important point:
"After this attack we had down in Cotton Mill Village, I think that was the tipping point for something else to come along as far as ordinances go," Jenkins said. "I'd seen dog bites before, but I'd never seen a mauling. A lot of people, if they had seen [Selman's injuries], they would have been like me, and their opinion would have softened if not completely changed."
Councilman Cedric Wilson was the lone opposition vote to the ordinance. He voiced several 25-year old themes about the pit bull debate. As Jenkins points out, however, the real issue is what victims like Christina Selman suffer in these terrible attacks. They do not suffer "dog bites," they suffer life-altering injuries. Following these injuries, they frequently must bear the weight of the medical bills as well. Attaining civil recourse in these attacks is often impossible.
Related articles:
04/30/09: NYC Housing Authorities Ban Pit Bulls, Rottweilers and Dobermans
04/18/09: Marine Corps Base Camp Lejeune Bans Dangerous Dog Breeds
03/18/09: Ridgeland, Mississippi Passes Pit Bull and Wolf-Hybrid Ban
03/17/09: U.S. Army Adopts Breed Restriction Policy for RCI Privatized Housing
This is fantastic! I am truly in awe of Jenkins. He really gets it. I'm just sorry it took the horrible mauling of Christina Selman to make this happen. I wish other municipalities and states would get proactive with dangerous dog laws and BSL, before another child is killed, or somebody else is scalped or maimed for life.
You are right, this was a very important comment from Mr Jenkins who is very perceptive
Other kinds of of dogs bite. Dog bites, you walk away from. PIT BULLS MAUL. Mauling means attacking until the victim dies or the mauler dies. Mauling means torn off limbs, missing flesh, missing eyeballs, bones crunched, reconstructive surgeries for decades.
And that is exactly what pit bulls have been selectively bred to do for hundreds of years- MAUL. They even have been bred to have the physical characteristics to maximize the physical destruction and damage.
They also have been bered to have a high prey drive, maximum strength, aggression, everything you need to have a mauler.
Man created pit bulls to do only bad things. And man needs to stop creating pit bulls. But some people make money from it, and those are the ones that the pawns like Cedric Wilson represent.
And notice how dangerous dog rules were in place that did NOTHING.
That too is a tactic of the pit bull breeders and fighters- get meaningless, worthless, toothless, useless dangerous dog laws passed so the pit bull breeders and fighters CAN GO ON DOING WHAT THEY WANT!
I'm glad the council "got it". I'm just sorry it took a terrible mauling to get it through their heads. Far too many law makers are reactive rather than pro-active. If public safety truly came first, no one in this nation would be allowed to own a pit bull.
Here were the out-of-state pit bull breeders sending out the call to hammer on the Fayette leaders to oppose this ban!
http://pitbullforum.com/viewtopic.php?t=120366&sid=f9120ac1912920eb93d42cb1413d77ca
And worst of all, here is the STAFF OF BEST FRIENDS ANIMAL SANCTUARY issuing forth PIT BULL BREEDER AND DOG FIGHTER PROPAGANDA IN THEIR NAME to get people to manipulate and coerce the leaders of Fayette to oppose bsl.
http://network.bestfriends.org/news/print.aspx?np=34265
Read this garbage! This is straight from the dog fighters! and filtered through Best Friends, a supposed humane organization!
Best Friends seems to be getting run by breeders and dog fighters now.
Best Friends left the Dog Fancy and became part of the "Maul Fancy" when they got invoived with Vicks dogs and saving the misunderstood thrice-biter Patron.
The message should be clear to the Pit Community by now…start breeding away from explosive dog and human aggression.
Speaking of Best Fiends, what do you expect of those who believe that dogs can foretell the coming of the end of the world. Do you think these people keep these dogs because they love them? They have them for a reason, so they can get a headstart on the end of the world. In the real world, it is known as paranoia.
P, I think the cult aspect and cult roots of Best Friends faded a while ago. The original founders are basically gone (except for profiting from merchandise sales but they aren't hanging around the sanctuary for that- they aren't on the board anymore), and I think the heavy-duty pit bull promotion is a new, bloodthirsty crowd that is taking over who wants to get their hands on the money (there's a lot just sitting in the bank) and also want to try to position themselves as "national experts" for the ego-jolt and $$ that brings and to push their agenda. This new Best Friends is a corporate Best Friends, and I think the humane aspect is disappearing.
Intreresting financials page on Best Friends. A bit outdated, but notice that Russ Mead makes at least a hundred thousand a year. I wonder how much VanKavage gets, and pension, and benefits, and everything else. And all she does is lobby.
http://www.bestfriendsinfo.com/Financial.html
Only 16 pit bull owners registered their dog by the due date! Now if they get caught, the city — by law — may have to take their dog away from them. I can hear the irresponsible nutters now, "The City killed my dog! This is genocide!"
That's right. It's pit bull genocide directly due to irresponsible pit bull owners.
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s of now, it's illegal to have any unregistered pit bulls in the city of Fayette. The deadline to get a permit for the animals was at 4 p.m. Two hours before the cut-off, only 16 were registered. The city first looked into drafting a 'viscious dog' ordinance in June after a woman was mauled by her neighbors pit bulls. She was hospitalized, but recovered with life-long scars and injuries. Owners of the animals had to pay 50 dollars for a permit, provide a picture and obtain liability insurance on their animals. Police Chief Danny Jenkins said many of them waited until the last miniute, "There are a lot of insurance companies who won't cover a specific breed of dog. They're in the business of reducing risk and if it's too risky they don't want any part. So, that tells me our mayor and city council made the right move on this." Anyone caught in the city with pit bull without a permit can be fined and summoned to court.
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http://www.abc3340.com/news/stories/0709/637389.html