Sign up for Humane Lobby Day today—beginners welcome!

Humane Lobby Day is next Thursday, February 17. This session is proving to be fast and furious and our fight for animal protections is in the thick of it. Don’t delay! Sign up today to join us in Olympia for Washington Humane Lobby Day.  Please pass this on to family, friends and co-workers.

To participate in Humane Lobby Day, you don’t need to be an expert in lobbying or legislation. Simply show up the day of and we’ll prep you with all you need to know to meet with your legislators.

Still not sure? Read below for more answers to frequently asked questions about attending Humane Lobby Day.
 

Why should I attend Humane Lobby Day?

You’d be amazed how a small number of people can change the course of a bill and impact future legislation. Your legislators want to hear from you—the people who put them in office—and Humane Lobby Day is the perfect group experience to meet your representatives face-to-face about issues that matter to you.

What kind of animal-related legislation are we fighting for this year?

2011 is an exciting year to support animals. Many bills are up, including: strengthening animal cruelty enforcement (HB 1147 & SSB 5065), anti-tethering protection for dogs (HB 1755 & SB 5649), and safeguarding  cougars from being hunted with hounds (HB 1124 & SB 5356).

What will I learn at Humane Lobby Day?

You’ll learn about 2011 legislation that impacts animals, and key talking points about each, to help you in your meetings with legislators. You’ll also get tips on how to appropriately meet with your legislators.

How long is the event?

The event runs from 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. and will be filled with presentations about the issues, lobbying basics, special guest legislators, snack breaks, and chances to network with other animal-welfare groups. If you can’t attend the entire day, don’t worry. Simply let us know and we’ll tell you when your scheduled appointment is with your legislators so you can plan your trip accordingly.

How will I get there?

It’s ideal to get a group together to carpool to Olympia. We will be sending out an update the week of the event concerning where the meeting room is. To help you determine your trip now, visit the Washington State Legislature website for a campus map, visitor parking and intercity transit shuttles.

What should I wear?

You’ll want to make a good impression during your meetings, so dress in a manner that shows respect for the office. No need for a three-piece suit, but slacks and a nice shirt are fine. Also, wear comfortable shoes as you may have to walk across campus more than once.

Your help preserving past victories and gaining support for animal protections will be paramount this year. Now is your chance to talk to your newly elected officials and incumbents in person. RSVP for Washington's Humane Lobby Day today and help shape future policy that impacts animals!

With your help, PAWS and our partner organizations can make a difference for animals in 2011.

Urgent Call to Action: Spay/Neuter Assistance Bill, SB 5151

We need your help with an URGENT action to keep an important bill alive in the Senate. To help, it's important you take action today.
 
Take less than 5 minutes to contact your Senator and let him or her know SB 5151 spay/neuter bill deserves a public hearing in the Senate.
 
Our friends at Save Washington Pets are working to support a spay/neuter bill in the Washington State legislature. SB 5151 would provide funding to assist low-income guardians of cats and dogs to obtain affordable spay/neuter surgeries, and to provide for spay/neuter surgeries of feral and free-roaming cats. The bill would prevent thousands of unwanted litters from ending up in shelters every year.
 
Senators are needed to request Senator Pridemore, chairman of the Government Operations, Tribal Relations & Elections Committee, hold a public hearing on the spay/neuter bill, SB 5151. By contacting your senators on SB 5151, you can sway them to advise Senator Pridemore and change the course of this bill. Please help today.
 
Thank you for helping keep this important legislation alive.

Have you signed up for 2011 Humane Lobby Day yet?

Sign up today to attend Washington's Humane Lobby Day on February 17 and help preserve important protections for animals in 2011.

Given our current Washington State budget crisis, this year will be a defensive one for policy impacting animals. Your help preserving past victories, while gaining support for future animal protections, will be paramount this year.

PAWS and the Humane Society of the United States invite you to join us at Humane Lobby Day this year on February 17. Come together with other animal advocates in making a difference for animals in 2011.

At Humane Lobby Day you’ll learn about 2011 legislation that impacts animals. You’ll also get tips on meeting with your legislators. Then, you’ll have the opportunity to meet directly with your elected officials and their staff about important animal-related bills that matter to you.

Legislators tell us they want to hear more from you—the people who put them in office! You’d be surprised to know that a handful of citizens can literally change the course of a bill by simply connecting with their legislators about what matters to them.

Now is your chance to talk to your newly elected officials and incumbents in person. RSVP for Washington's Humane Lobby Day for a chance to meet your legislators and help shape future policy that impacts animals.

Gifts and Stocking Stuffers for the Animal Lover

 
Any donation gift card or PAWS Store purchase made by December 17 will still arrive before the Christmas holiday!
 

Make a donation in his/her honor!
To make a holiday donation in honor of a friend, family member or animal in your life, you can contribute to the animals at PAWS online. You’ll be helping the animals at PAWS, and we’ll send a special card to your honoree.

Fill their stockings with gifts from the PAWS Store
If you are looking for great gifts that give back, browse the PAWS Store for comfortable and fashionable apparel, dog leashes, water bottles, as well as the PAWS 2011 Calendar, gift memberships and more for every animal lover on your holiday list.

Gifts and purchases made this holiday season help the animals in our care today, and will help thousands more in the year ahead. Thank you!

Snohomish County Animal Sheltering Contract Remains with PAWS

In these tough economic times, communities across the state are making difficult budgetary decisions, often involving the cutting of services. During the budgeting process, Snohomish County considered eliminating funding for the shelter service contract it had with PAWS for over 20 years. In 2009 alone, PAWS took in more than 1,200 stray cats and dogs from unincorporated Snohomish County.

Fortunately, after listening to the concerns of citizens and PAWS, the County Council voted to retain the funding necessary to support this important service.

We are very appreciative of the Council's support and understanding of the importance of providing citizens with two convenient and reliable options when they find a stray cat or dog—the PAWS Companion Animal Shelter and the Everett Animal Shelter. This is great news for the animals and citizens of Snohomish County.

Thank you also to our supporters who live and do business in Snohomish County who reached out to the County Council and other key figures to help PAWS retain this contract and provide this important service to our community.

Thank you!

As we sit down to celebrate our friendships and family this Thanksgiving Day, I give my heartfelt thanks to every one of PAWS’ friends who give second chances to animals in need.

Without our family of supporters, the work we do would not be possible. It’s your help that has saved the lives of the animals you see pictured here, and thousands of others this year.

Thank you!
Annette

   

   

The Facts About PAWS’ Contract with Snohomish County

You may have heard the news about Snohomish County potentially ending its contract with PAWS to house stray animals from unincorporated areas. The contract is scheduled to end effective January 1, 2011 if approved by the Snohomish County Council.  PAWS is deeply concerned about the effect this will have on the community and its animals. We have been proud to serve as the animal shelter for Snohomish County for more than 20 years, and have been an essential resource and safety net for the citizens and animals of the County for more than 40 years.

If the proposed 2011 Snohomish County Budget is approved as-is, animals like Cora, who was found in unincorporated Snohomish County, would no longer be brought to PAWS for sheltering.

The number of animals

PAWS and the Everett Animal Shelter have been the contracted agencies to provide stray services for the County for quite some time. In 2009, PAWS housed more than 1,200 stray cats and dogs from unincorporated Snohomish County, the vast majority brought to us by caring citizens who took time to bring lost, scared animals to safety.

If the County ends its contract with PAWS, citizens will have only one place to take those animals.  Per Snohomish County Code 9.12.055, PAWS will not be allowed to take in and house stray animals from unincorporated areas of Snohomish County, and will have to instruct citizens to take strays to the one designated County shelter in Everett.

Tough choices

Times are tough and PAWS supports the County in efforts to achieve a sustainable budget. We appreciate that the budget would still retain key services sought by the community, including animal sheltering services. In this economy we are seeing an ever increasing number of animals abandoned and neglected because of foreclosures, evictions, job loss and hard times. Eliminating PAWS as a location where citizens and animal control officers can bring animals does not reduce the need. It simply makes the service less convenient and less accessible.

We are concerned that the elimination of a second animal shelter within the County will not achieve the financial reductions envisioned by the Auditor’s office, and will negatively impact the citizens at a time when so many are experiencing the hardships of a difficult economy.

PAWS is concerned that fewer animals will be picked up which would mean more animals on the street to become injured, to potentially cause car accidents when they run into the road, and to breed, thus increasing the overall number of animals who will need help.

The County Auditor stated that one of the reasons behind the elimination of this contract for cost savings is the annexations proposed to occur sometime in late 2012, which might diminish the need for stray services in the southern portion of the County. We aren’t aware of any date certain for annexations, but agree when they occur, it would be appropriate for the County to no longer provide for stray services in the affected area of the County.

PAWS is also concerned for our colleagues at the City of Everett animal shelter. We fear that taking on an additional 1,000-plus animals at a time when they recently expressed a lack of sufficient staffing to handle the current workload, will stretch the facility and staff to a point where they may face the need to euthanize healthy, adoptable animals – a practice they have worked very hard to avoid.

PAWS’ shelter is not closing

If this decision goes through, it affects our ability to take in strays from unincorporated areas of Snohomish County. However, PAWS will continue to take in owner-surrendered cats and dogs as we have the space and resources, as we always have. We will continue to provide adoption services—through PAWS last year more than 2,000 cats, dogs, puppies and kittens were matched with loving families. PAWS contracts to house strays with other municipalities and will continue to take in stray animals from Brier, Bothell, Kenmore, Lynnwood, Lake Forest Park, Mill Creek, Mukilteo and Shoreline.

A Northwest leader since 1967, PAWS also rehabilitates injured and orphaned wildlife, offers effective, humane information for preventing conflicts with wild animals, and provides educational programs in area schools and throughout the community. Community support and the work of more than 1,000 volunteers are vital to PAWS' ability to do this work. 

What you can do

The Snohomish County Council is accepting comments and community input on the proposed budget, and would appreciate your views on the Executive’s proposal regarding stray services for animals from unincorporated Snohomish County. The County budget will be approved by November 22. If you’d like to comment on the 2011 proposed budget, you can do so through the County’s website or by contacting your councilmember.

 

Anti-Crush Video Act Passes House, Moves On to Senate

Great news! On July 21, the U.S. House of Representatives passed an act that would prevent the commercial trade of the horrible “crush” videos (showing women’s high heels crushing and impaling small animals). The vote was almost unanimously in favor. Thank you to everyone who contacted your representative to make this happen! Read my previous post asking you to take action on this act.

Congress is about to adjourn for the summer, but when they return in September, we hope to see the Senate introduce the companion bill and move it just as quickly through the process. I’ll keep you posted.

Help Ban Horrifying “Crush” Videos

Ever heard of “crush” videos? How about as they relate to animal cruelty? If you’ve got a horrible image going in your mind, you won’t believe that creating and selling these videos are now legal again. Are you appalled? I know I was when I read about it. 

This April, the U.S. Supreme Court overturned a 10-year federal law that made it illegal to create and sell these brutal “crush” videos of torture on defenseless animals.

So what can you do?

Simply enter your state and zip and use the message below to ask your U.S. Representative to co-sponsor and support H.R. 5092 amending the Crush Act. It’s important to personalize the subject line and add polite, personal touches to the email below. Congress gets a ton of email so we need to get yours noticed. 

Dear (Your Representative’s Name),

As your constituent, I’m asking you to co-sponsor and support H.R. 5092 amending the Crush Act if you have not already done so.

Before a 1999 law was enacted, approximately 3,000 horrifying “crush" videos were available, selling for up to $300 apiece. Those videos (entailing acts such as women in high-heeled shoes impaling and torturing small animals) disappeared soon after the law was passed.

I hope you will work to get H.R. 5092 enacted amending the Crush Act so that we can once again ban this kind of intentional torture of defenseless animals for the sake of profit.

Sincerely,
(Your name, phone number and home address)

Research shows people who abuse animals are more likely to be violent toward other people. These “crush” videos not only cause horrible animal suffering, but they promote violence to both animals and humans.

Public outrage over these videos helped to put a law in place in 1999 banning the commercial sale of this kind of animal cruelty. We can do it again. Write your legislators!

Read more on actions taken to ban “crush” videos and background on the recent U.S. Supreme Court ruling and a more background on a 2009 investigation and 1999 ruling.

As a new blogger for PAWS, I’m excited to share my world of “public affairs” with you. I’ll be blogging about animal issues, legislation that impacts animals, and how you can transform your animal compassion into action!

Welcome!

I wanted to be the first to welcome you to the new and improved paws.org!

We hope you like the changes. With lots of photos showcasing the amazing animals we are honored to help every day, clear and simple navigation, and the new blog, you can stay up-to-date on issues, find solutions for challenges you may be having with an animal, and be inspired by the breathtaking stories your support makes possible. 

While the site may look different, you’ll still find lots of useful fact sheets in our Resource Library. You can treat yourself to browsing photos and descriptions of the many wonderful animals available for adoption. Check out the cool and educational kids section with many ideas on fun activities kids can do to help animals. Stay updated on happenings at PAWS in our events calendar. And if you are looking for effective, humane solutions for conflicts with wildlife, we can offer you lots of great tips.

Please take a few moments to see what we’ve created for you.  Let us know what you think by e-mailing webmaster@paws.org. Your feedback is always welcome!

All the best,

Annette Laico
Executive Director