News
UPDATE: HB 562 Now in Committee!
February 17, 2009, 9:37AM MT
By Jennifer S Hayes
Bill Needs Your Support to Pass
Bill Needs Your Support to Pass
By Ledy VanKavage, Best Friends staff
UPDATE (4/24/09)
We urge Illinois residents to contact your state Senators and members of the Senate Human Services Committee today and ask them to vote YES to S.B. 90/H.B. 562.
Not sure who represents you? Click here to determine your state Senator by inputting your address or nine digit zip code.
Contact information for Senate Human Services Committee members.
If S.B. 90/H.B. 562 becomes law, it will require cross reporting of child abuse and animal abuse.
These related bills instruct animal control officers or humane society investigators, who have reasonable cause to suspect or believe that a child is being abused or neglected, to make an oral or written report to the Department of Children and Family Services. It also requires that any mandated reporters under the Abused and Neglected Child Reporting Act, who suspect or believe an animal is being abused or neglected, must report this to the Department of Agriculture’s Bureau of Animal Welfare.
Louisiana, West Virginia, Nebraska, Tennessee, Maine, California and Oregon have enacted similar legislation.
The link between animal abuse and child abuse is well documented; in fact, pets are frequently used as pawns in family violence situations.
Indeed, a 1983 study revealed that animals were abused in eighty-eight percent of families in which children were abused. The National Coalition Against Domestic Violence conducted a survey which included battered women and children’s shelters and children’s counseling programs. Eighty-five percent of the women and sixty three percent of the children who went to domestic violence shelters reported incidents of pet abuse.
Thank you for your consideration in this important matter.
HOW YOU CAN HELP:
? Illinois residents are asked to politely and professionally contact your own state Senator and members of the Senate Human Services Committee to ask that they vote YES S.B. 90/H.B. 562.
Not sure who represents you? Click here to determine your state Senator by inputting your address or nine digit zip code.
Contact information for Senate Human Services Committee members.
For more information:
• No More Homeless Pets Forum: The Link: Animal Abuse and Violence
• American Humane The Link®
Posted by Jennifer Hayes, Best Friends staff
Photo credit: taken by Jennifer Hayes
**Best Friends Animal Society supports this legislation.