Strengthen the law in what way? Get it right or there will be more deaths

If all that lawmakers do, is to put more stringent confinement laws on dogs - stronger chains and pens and more muzzling - children will still die because there is no way to enforce those restrictions. Dogs get loose, especially so when owned by the chronically irresponsible sort of person who keeps dangerous dogs.

Those restrictions just reinforce what is causing the danger now - the desocializing of dogs through isolation. They do nothing to address the easy production and owning of dogs bred to protect and fight. Many reports come to AAS about Pit bull pups being sold openly at flea markets. The AAS database of BC breeders is full of Rottweiler breeders. Dog breeding is a multi-million dollar unregulated, untaxed industry, often combined with drug growing and dealing. Pit bulls are the breed preferred by biker gangs and Indo Canadian gangs; Rottweilers are the breed preferred by Asian gangs, guard dog companies, and the average home owner in East Vancouver who has a frightening (and miserable) dog in the yard.

Beginning in 2001, AAS advocated for an end to the cruelty and danger of desocialized yard dogs. In our 40 page report that year to the City of Vancouver, we educated the Mayor and Councillors about the widespread danger from yard dogs and cruelty to dogs that had become a plague in the last decade. The City said it was up to the SPCA to do something. The SPCA told the City it would and then did nothing, not even trying education, one of its promises to the City. That the City did nothing, not even making the SPCA do what it promised, in spite of ongoing reports by AAS, is morally shameful. Not even after Shenica White's face and future were changed forever, were charges laid or any changes made.

No one protected Cody. No lawmaker in Maple Ridge or in all of BC did anything to intelligently and seriously prevent his death. BC's Dangerous Dog law, which the SPCA supported (it is the biggest paid enforcer of dog laws and disposer of dangerous dogs in BC), would not have prevented Cody's death, as it only addresses after-the-fact dangerous behaviour.

The SPCA is the contracted dog controller in Maple Ridge. Did the SPCA report to the Children's Ministry that a dog it had deemed dangerous was living with children? The SPCA was quick enough to say it had a duty to kill Cheech, a dog who had never bitten anyone and who is gentle and loving with children.

Dog owning has increased many hundreds-fold in the last decades. Dogs are hunters by nature; by nature they are all inherently dangerous. But a small dog with attitude is a joke. A large dog with attitude is a danger. And it is large dogs, especially protection/fighting breeds, that suffer most from isolation, neglect, and cruelty.

AAS's suggestions for a double-barrelled, proactive approach to the problem of danger and cruelty are:

1. Control the breeding of all breeds through breeding licensing. Fees on the multi-million dollar dog breeding industry would more than pay for enforcement. Fees charged to cross-breed backyard breeding will almost stop this underground industry as the pups can not be sold for more than $50 to $100 dollars each.

2. Reduce and discourage the breeding of the largest breeds with a sliding fee scale based on average breed weight.

3. Reduce and discourage the breeding of protection/fighting breeds with a surcharge on those breeds.

4. Prohibit the breeding and owning of the very large, dangerous breeds that are infiltrating the criminal culture: Cane Corso, Fila Mastiff, Argentino Dogo, etc.

5. Licence dog owners: Anyone with a record of a biting dog may have their licence revoked in BC, if reckless disregard can be shown or the bite causes a permanent injury.

6. Ban the guard dog industry.

7. Prohibit the keeping of dogs in conditions that desocialize them: isolated on chains or tethers, in yards, in garages, on decks and porches. This prohibition would not only reduce the danger of dogs, but would reduce the cruelty to dogs.

The SPCA has never asked for any breeding regulations, yet it is the SPCA that is the biggest agency in BC that collects and disposes of the dogs that no decent person wants.