Stop puppy mills with amendment

In 2010, Missouri voters passed a ballot measure to set standards of care for dogs in large-scale commercial puppy mills (“This dog won’t hunt,” Dispatch editorial, Friday). Just a few months later, before the measure could even take effect, state lawmakers aligned with the puppy-mill industry gutted and weakened the standards.

Missouri is the nation’s top puppy-mill state, and Ohio is second. What’s to stop Ohio legislators from doing the same thing and overturning common-sense standards for the care of dogs? The most recent action taken by the Ohio legislature on the puppy-mill issue was to overturn local town and city ordinances protecting consumers from buying puppy-mill dogs from pet stores.

The only way to prevent the puppy-mill measure from legislative repeal is to pass a constitutional amendment. Trust the voters. Ohio voters should say “yes” to the measure to stop puppy mills in our state.

Karen Minton Dublin pockets of inhumane dog breeders, would anyone want to stop such a measure that could end the abuse, mistreatment, and neglect that’s been allowed to take place in Ohio? The Ohio Puppy Mill Prevention Amendment would enact the kind of standards most Ohioans assume breeders already meet. Ohio’s puppy-mill problem is not going away unless we act to put bad breeders out of businesses. This measure might be the only chance we have to make a real difference.