You can help legalize ferrets in California! Here's how:
 
There is a bill in the California State Assembly (AB 363) to legalize
ferrets by reclassifying them as domesticated.  Despite fierce opposition by
the California Farm Bureau, members of the Assembly Water, Parks and
Wildlife Committee voted last week to support AB 363 -- though by only one
vote.  The bill has been passed on to the Assembly Appropriations Committee,
which will review the bill on May 7th.
 
If you live in CA (or know someone who does), please write or call the
Chairperson, Carole Migden, and ask her to support this bill.  (A list of
the other committee members follows.) Since the Appropriations Committee is
concerned with fiscal impact, tell her that AB 363 will save California
potentially millions of tax dollars currently wasted on enforcing the
outdated (and ridiculous) classification of ferrets as wild animals.  With
regard to concern voiced over the difficulty (and cost) of requiring ferret
owners to spay/neuter their pets, remind her that 90% of female ferrets die
if they go into heat and are not bred, and all intact males urinate
everywhere and smell too offensively to be a pet.  Spaying and neutering of
ferrets won?t have to be externally enforced, becaused people simply do not
tolerate the behavior of intact ferrets.
 
Remind Ms. Migden that ferrets are legal in 48 states and virtually the rest
of the world.  There is no evidence that they become feral or are any threat
to the agriculture or farm industries.  Ironically, nearly every other
legal-to-own farm animal or pet (cats, dogs, pigs, chickens, etc.) DOES go
feral -- ferrets would be the exception to the rule!
 
The California Farm Bureau is lobbying hard to kill this bill, and has the
legislative influence to do just that.  It?s us individual ferret lovers
versus one of the biggest industries in this state -- we have to fight hard
to win this one!
 
Your support at this time is imperative.  May 7 is only two weeks away!
Please write and/or call Carole Migden and your Assemblymember.  One letter
is said to represent 100 voters of the same opinion.
 
To find out more about this issue and to research your representatives,
go to:
http://users.ccnet.com/~beisners/gsfs/lobby.html or
http://ais3.assembly.ca.gov/acs/acsframeset7.htm
 
Thank you for your support.  THIS EFFORT WON'T BE SUCCESSFUL WITHOUT YOUR
HELP!
 
Assembly Appropriations Committee members:
Carole Migden, Chair, Appropriations Committee
1388 Sutter Street, Suite 710
San Francisco, CA 94109
(415) 673-5560
 
Dick Ackerman, Fullerton
Fred Aguiar, Ontario
Joe Baca, San Bernardino
Tom J. Bordonaro, Jr., San Luis Obispo
Marilyn C. Brewer, Irvine
Louis J. Papan, Millbrae
Don Perata, Oakland
Michael Sweeney, Hayward
Antonio Villaraigosa, Los Angeles
Carl Washington, Compton
 
 ===========================================================================
 
Amy Umpleby...........
[log in to unmask]
phone: (415) 506-9193
fax:   (415) 506-7103
[Posted in FML issue 1911]