Senator Lesniak is attempting to take away NJ voters rights to purchase a puppy or kitten from a reliable source and pushing citizens to obtain their next pet from shelter or rescue sources only! Bill #S63 bans the sale of puppies and kittens from licensed pet shops AND bans all breeders and buyers from selling or purchasing their pet from anyone outside of the state of NJ via online transactions, face to face transactions only!
While everyone supports shelter animals and adoptions, to ban everyone in the entire state of their CHOICE of whether to adopt or shop, or where to purchase a quality bred puppy or kitten is not the American way.
Here is the meat and potatoes of this bill if it passes:
1. Want to purchase your next puppy or kitten from a wonderful, conscientious breeder in California? Sorry, Lesniak says you won’t be able to unless you are willing to fly or drive to California and do a “face to face transaction”! No Internet sales are allowed!
2. Are you a reputable breeder in NJ and have found some wonderful homes for your upcoming litter but they live in other states? Sorry, unless those wonderful homes are willing to come directly to you and do a face to face transaction, you are limited to finding homes for your babies only in the local area!
3. Are you a breeder in or out of the state of NJ that buys and/or sells puppies/kittens to other breeders to diversify/improve your breeding line? You will no longer be able to have that great working relationship to better your breed because no sales in or out of the state of NJ will be allowed unless they are IN PERSON transactions!!!
4. Do you want to find a good, local pet shop with puppies/kittens available from reputable sources? There are NONE, because all pet stores are banned from selling puppies/kittens from ANY source other than a shelter or rescue group!
THINK about what that means…
Suppose you want to buy a Siamese kitten or a Collie puppy and there are no breeders or available litters within driving distance of NJ, Senator Lesniak says: “tough” you can’t have the puppy or kitten of your choice from a reputable breeder of your choice; go adopt a shelter dog/cat instead! What if you do the research and find out that the type of puppy or kitten you want from a reputable breeder is only available in Nebraska? Unless you want to fork over the extra money to fly out to Nebraska to do an “in person transaction”, you are out of luck, go adopt a shelter or rescue pet.
Want to purchase your next puppy or kitten from a pet shop? Nope, the only animals that will be found now at pet shops will be shelters animals for adoption. And what happened to all the health warrantees that pet shops were previously required to offer to protect purchasers? Well Shelters and Rescues are EXEMPT from offering even the most basic of background information or warrantees to say that the adopted pet is healthy!
And the most important thing to remember here folks:
Contrary to what Lesniak says, that he is pushing this bill to help reduce homeless pets, there will always be plenty of shelter/rescue pets available because there are ZERO regulations preventing them from being imported from elsewhere and there are ZERO regulations requiring shelters or rescue groups to provide adopters with even the most basic of background information or warrantees to say that the adopted pet is healthy!
Please sign the petition
https://www.change.org/p/adopt-or-shop-it-s-your-choice