TOMORROW, WED JUNE 10 at 10a.m:
CALL LOS ANGELES CITY COUNCIL RE LIVE ANIMAL MARKETS
Please call the Los Angeles City Council tomorrow morning at 10 a.m. to ask to speak on agenda item 11 to support Councilmembers Koretz' and Blumenfield's motion to close all live animal markets. You do not have to live in LA to call. You will have one minute to speak.
DIAL-IN INFO
Members of the public who wish to offer public comment to the Council should call 1 669 254 5252 and use Meeting ID No. 160 535 8466 and then press #. Press # again when prompted for participant ID. Once admitted into the meeting, press *9 to request to speak.
It is recommended that you call right at 10, and listen to the meeting until comments are called for, toward the beginning. Please listen to earlier comments so that you can mention points that have not been made.
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TALKING POINTS
- We are now, more than ever, concerned about health and the transfer of disease through the handling of animals.
- Animals in crowded conditions are likely to transmit disease when stressed.
- Prevention is key. Salmonella, Pasteurella, giardia and many other zoonotic diseases are a daily threat.
- Crowding, transporting, caging and neglecting basic needs are inhumane treatment of animals.
- Poultry, ducks, goats, sheep, rabbits, turtles, bullfrogs, snakes, even alligator parts have been found in the live animal markets. The more species we exploit, the greater risk we take with public health.
- Although it's illegal, fully-alive animals may be sold to customers to take home to slaughter or otherwise use and exploit.
- Frogs and turtles that are sold under the table suffer particular abuse because they often do not have water and suffocate, stacked in containers.
- By snatching the frogs, turtles, snakes and other wild animals from their natural habitats, we are upsetting nature's balance and threatening biodiversity.
- The cruelty for softshell turtles is unspeakable. The animals should be first clubbed on the head to render them unconscious, but turtles naturally retreat into their shells. The result is that these turtles have their shells butchered from their bodies while fully alive.
- Bullfrogs carry the dread chytrid fungus, which is responsible for an unprecedented loss of species, including native California species like our state amphibian, the California red-legged frog.
- 2 million live bullfrogs and 400,000 turtles are trafficked and imported to California annually. There is no disease testing or quarantine of these animals before they are brought to the markets.
- We are concerned that zoning ordinances which prohibit slaughter may not be enforced for these areas where markets are found.
- Businesses, themselves, should not need to close; but the sale and slaughter-on-demand of live/living animals should be prohibited in this age of emerging zoonotic diseases.
- Senator Stern has introduced a bill to require such testing statewide, and to close wild animal markets in California, but the bill addresses other wildlife issues—and wildlife only. The City should employ the safeguard of its own ordinance.
- It would be a tragic irony if Los Angeles, one of the most progressive cities in the world, were to become the epicenter for a future pandemic. We must do everything in our power to make sure it doesn't happen.
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Most of the pictures below are from markets in Los Angeles, except the diseased frogs and the one of a chicken being carried in a bag alive (this came from a market in San Francisco, but we are aware that it happens at all of the markets).
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Thank You for Your Support
Thank you for your contributions and notes of support. PawPAC will contribute to campaigns of candidates who demonstrate their advocacy for animals, but we can't do it without you. Candidates are more sensitive to the issues we voice when we support them. Please consider volunteering, or share our work with a friend and ask them to contribute. Time and money are the animals' two greatest assets.
For the animals,
René Rowland, Chair
info@pawpac.org
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