Yesterday a victory was achieved for ferret owners with disabilities.
Frances Woodard suffers from panic attacks, her ferret Gyno sooths her
and prevents the attacks from happening. Her psychiatrist filled out
the necessary paperwork to have Gyno as a service animal, however, the
bus company took back the pass.

This is part of a posting made by Frances;
Tomorrow (21AUG) my lawyer and OC Transpo sign papers and Gyno gets
his pass back. My council-woman has put in a motion to create a bill
pertaining to assist animals and what defines an assist animal so that
this never happens to someone else. It has been a long hard fight, and
a lot of nights crying myself to sleep but I feel it is worth it. There
is hope for all us ferret owners out there. It's not fully over yet,
but I will be able to ride the bus again (my wheelchair just doesn't
fit in a car) The best part of the meeting today was when Councillor
McCrae asked the representative from OC Transpo how many complaints
they had had about me and my ferret and he looked down at the table and
very quietly said "none" and she said "Then why the hell did you take
her pass in the first place" That was so great. Thanks so much, Frances

I would like to thank everyone who submitted an email of protest, on
her behave, to the parties concerned.

I personally loved on the local TV news how they referred to it as
"don't get between a woman and her ferret, the ferret community will
bite back". The whole issue obviously had turned into a "hot potato".

Gary
Ottawa, Ontario, Canada

[Posted in FML 6070]