Page 5 - Issue 3_2018

Message from the President

William I. Christensen, MD, MPH

I should like to thank Kathy Wakeman of Colorado for non-existent, and to better track their movements from shelter to shel-
submitting her qualifications for administrator of the ter within the U.S Palm Springs city councilor Christy Holstege, who is
ATCA Facebook page and congratulate her on being sponsoring the breeding ban “on behalf” of the shelter, for whom she is
chosen for the position. The board received several also a board member, admitted to a group of us from the Kennel Club
applications from very well qualified members, and of Palm Springs, that a significant number of dogs were being shipped
we had a tough time selecting just one person. I was from the Palm Springs shelter to shelters in Washington state, which
heartened by the abilities and interest of our members represented a bigger market for adoption. Both Patti Strand of NAIA
and would encourage them to apply this interest and and Shelia Goff, V.P. of AKC Government Relations, have attempted
these abilities to other work within the ATCA committee structure. to increase the recognition of this problem, but with the “don’t shop,
adopt” slogan of the animal rights supporters, recognition of the
As an example, Susan Saulvester and her committee of members ac- dimensions of this problem by potential animal owners, especially
tive in performance events are working hard on the demanding task young people, has been disappointingly slow. I would recommend
of trying to incorporate appropriate recognition for each of the rapidly that ATCA members educate themselves by visiting the NAIA website
increasing numbers of AKC performance events into the overall as well as looking up Shelia Goff’s interview by Fox News on the AKC
calculation of eligibility for the ATCA Versatility Award. The popular- website, where it is featured in the Government Relations blogs. What
ity of performance events with the general public as well as with new has come to my community may well come to yours, and it would be in
purebred dog owners is growing rapidly, and we need to encourage everyone’s interest if you were well prepared.
and reward this enthusiasm as a means of promoting the virtues of
the Australian Terrier in many different venues. I feel that increased
visibility is important in what has been called the “sustainability” of our
breed.

Board members Alexa Samarotto and Pat Zupan are busy working-up
their report on “sustainability” derived from their participation at the
Parent Club Education Day seminars held in Newark, NJ on June 10.
I am eagerly awaiting their report and would like to move forward
with the creation of a “breed sustainability” committee later this fall.
A few days ago, Kerrie Bryant e-mailed the membership Mark Dunn’s
updated data on the numbers of dogs and litters registered by breed,
and, unfortunately, the numbers for Australian Terriers continue to
decline.

An important point is that the “sustainability” of a breed necessarily
depends on actually breeding dogs. The issue of breeding purebred
dogs has become a very personal one for me as the Palm Springs City
Council is currently considering a breeding ban on dogs and cats.
Although the alleged impetus for this was a request from the Friends
of the Palm Springs Animal Shelter, a private no-kill advocacy group,
who, as the result of a process which was not entirely transparent, was
awarded a contract by the city to operate the shelter. The shelter’s
argument is that the (improbably) large number of “stray” dogs im-
pounded in Palm Springs during the year can be blamed on “backyard
breeders” as well as the breeders of “fighting dogs,” although this con-
tention is not supported by any currently available data. Previously
passed by council was a ban on “pet shops,” so that, if the breeding
ban passes, the only dogs and cats available will be from the Palm
Springs shelter.

Compounding this issue and not yet sufficiently recognized by
members of the fancy, to say nothing of the general public, is the role
of imported dogs, which may well number as many as one million a
year, in increasing the numbers of homeless dogs as well as serving as
a wholesale source for the retailing of these animals by the “shelters”
who have “rescued” them. These dogs have brought with them rabies,
brucellosis (as many as 20% of those imported from Mexico), drug-
resistant heartworms, and a variety of other diseases novel to our
domestic dogs. The AKC is working on federal legislation to require
better health screening of these imported dogs, which is now largely

5
5