Council delays action on animal welfare bill
Legislation aims to refine law dealing with aggressive creatures
After roughly two and a half months of discussion, the Anne Arundel County Council scrapped part of an animal welfare bill Monday night to allow for more input.
The legislation aims to refine Lilo’s Law, a 2017 bill that sets actions that can be taken to deal with aggressive animals, the most serious of which results in euthanasia. When animal welfare advocates and stakeholder group members noticed a series of amendments, particularly one allowing a pet owner to have their animal’s “potentially dangerous” or “dangerous” designation reconsidered, they requested the council pause discussions until lawmakers and animal welfare advisory groups have had time to discuss the new proposals.
Council member Julie Hummer, a Laurel Democrat, explained there was a time crunch and that changes to the bill were being discussed up until the start of the meeting
Monday. That was the last day to amend the bill, which expires April 6. She acknowledged the council hadn’t struck the right balance yet.
“As with any bill that comes up with animal welfare, it’s very emotional, we all care very much for our animals and we want to get this right,” said Hummer, who offered several amendments Monday night.
The bill was drafted by County Executive Steuart Pittman’s staff.
When the 2017 County Council passed Lilo’s Law, they created the vicious designation for animals that kill or severely injure a person or other animal. However, that legislation put the responsibility on animal control to determine what constitutes sufficient proof to deem a pet vicious.
This has resulted in animals languishing on death row without much evidence of them having committed any harm.
Debate over the bill reached a turning point in January 2021 when a Millersville resident, Daniel Stinchcomb, accused his neighbor’s dogs, Odin and Lucy, of killing his cat,
Big Boy. He was the only eyewitness who came forward and left town soon after, never appearing at any subsequent court proceeding. After spending a year in animal control, the dogs were released back to their family after the courts concluded there was a lack of evidence that the dogs caused the cat’s death.
Around the time of the Odin and Lucy’s release, Pittman stated he was concerned with the rigidity of Lilo’s Law and vowed to address it. The new iteration of the bill would better outline what kind of proof should be required for an attack triggering a vicious designation.
From the start, discussions of the bill this year have been fraught. The county executive’s staff has argued the paramount concern should be raising the bar for evidence, asserting that hearsay should not be enough to lead to a death sentence. Animal welfare advocates contend that these cases are complicated, and evidence sometimes isn’t concrete.
The county executive’s side ultimately won out and language prohibiting only hearsay evidence was written into the bill. His team also assured advocates that the types of evidence they’ve observed in these cases, including ring camera footage, would meet the standard.
However, Hummer’s amendments Monday night led advocates to become concerned about the bill once again. Most of the changes would have added definitions where there were gray areas. The changes included specifying conditions under which a potentially dangerous or dangerous animal must be kept on a leash and away from children; more detail around what animal control should look for when determining an animal is potentially dangerous, dangerous or vicious; and establishing a definition for “public safety threat.” A fourth amendment would set standards for how a pet owner could get their animal’s designation reconsidered.
Jennifer Brienza from the Animal Matters Commission voiced her frustration about “sweeping changes” being considered without input from the commission.
“For these amendments to be rushed through without being vetted by the appropriate agencies would clearly be irresponsible,” Brienza said.
The amendment creating a path for reconsidering of an animal’s designation was particularly concerning to Linda Mazer, vice chair of the county’s Animal Welfare Council.
“With over 300 dogs currently on the dangerous dog registry, allowing each dog to have their designation reconsidered may overwhelm the current system of the hearings,” Mazer said.
After hearing the testimony, Hummer and the council eliminated the parts of the bill relating to the potentially dangerous, dangerous and vicious designations, buying the council time to create a new bill with more input from the stakeholder groups.
“I think it’s been very clear as we go through all this discussion that not everyone is going to be 100% happy with anything that we pass,” Hummer said. “We’re going to try to get as close to that as possible.”
Her amendments added specifications to some critical gaps in the bill, she said. Hummer said she does plan to bring them back after talking to the advisory groups.
“We’re disappointed it’s gotten to this point,” said Ethan Hunt, Pittman’s director of government affairs. “We thought this bill struck the right balance between protecting public safety and protecting the owners of dogs who are accused of attacking other animals. By striking all this language we are undoing all of that.”
Hummer, Lisa Rodvien, an Annapolis Democrat, Shannon Leadbetter, a Crofton Republican, and Nathan Volke, a Pasadena Republican, agreed to ensure the parts of the bill that had been agreed upon would come back in the next version.
“Let’s get it right,” Volke said.
The remaining pieces of the bill, which will be voted on next week, enable animal control to waive certain fees for adoptions, spays and neuters and adjust how the agency carries out cruelty cases.