Kudos to State Sen. Dean Florez for proposing SB 250, which would require dogs in California to be spayed or neutered unless their guardians obtain an unaltered dog license, and requires guardians of unaltered cats to keep them indoors.
Â
Every year, about one million cats and dogs enter our state’s animal shelters. More than half of them are euthanized, simply because there aren’t enough good homes for them. The bill would help reduce those numbers, by encouraging people to be responsible and have their animals spayed or neutered.
Â
Even people who don’t give two cents about animals should support this bill, because our state’s companion-animal overpopulation crisis affects every taxpayer: It costs more than $250 million to shelter and euthanize homeless animals every year. Please choose what’s best for the animals and our state: Support SB 250 and have cats and dogs spayed or neutered.
This article appears in Mar 5-12, 2009.