OPERATION "CHRISTMAS LIST" TO AID FIGHT FOR CALIFORNIA LEGALIZATION You can help California ferret owners in their fight to win legalization even if you're from out-of-state! Ask your Golden State friends and relatives to voice their support of the bill now making its way through the California legislature. Assembly Bill 363 (AB 363) would permit the importation, sale, and ownership of ferrets in California as long as the animal has had its rabies vaccination and has been spayed/neutered. The bill also removes the ferret (Mustela furo), from the list of prohibited wildlife, and defines it as a domestic animal on par with dogs and cats. This Bill is already under fire by the Farm Bureau, the Sierra Club, and the Audubon Society, as well as by the California Departments of Fish and Game and of Health. If AB 363 is to get further in the legislative process, let alone make it to the Governor's desk, it needs the support of more Californians. That's where YOU can help. Please call, write, or e-mail all of the Californians you know and ask them to write or fax their state assemblymen/women and state senators in support of AB 363. Please raid your Christmas or Chanukah card lists, alumni and professional association directories, and your address book for Golden Staters. Please urge your friends, relatives, and old roommates to express their support of AB 363, even if they don't have ferrets. They can write their assembly and senate members and simply say that they support AB 363. They can say how much they resent the waste of their tax dollars on the discriminatory enforcement of the ferret laws. They can say how much they resent that YOU can't come to visit them. They can say how shocked they are to discover that their state forces teachers to lie *, and throws people in jail for their choice of pet. What's important is that they write or fax their California assembly and senate members in support of AB 363 NOW. If your friends need more information about the ferret bill, they can contact Californians for Ferret Legalization (CFL) at 410 Mountain Home Rd / Woodside CA 94062 (415) 851-3750 e-mail [log in to unmask] WWW: http://www.ccnet.com/~beisners/gsfs/lobby.html If they need the name and address of their assembly or senate member, they should be listed in the Government pages of their telephone book, or they can contact CFL. Californians may participate in this project, too! :-) Thank you! -- Lee, ex-pat CA native * In order to obtain an permit to keep a ferret for educational purposes, teachers must sign an oath stating that they will always tell the public that ferrets are wild animals that attack children without provocation. -- Lee [log in to unmask] [Posted in FML issue 1911]