Don't know if it's of any interest to anyone, don't really mean to bring up a huge debate regarding BSL again - mod's, feel free to lock this post if you so desire, but I thought it might at least be interesting reading:

http://www.billingsgazette.com/index.php...it-bull-ban.inc

"DENVER - A few weeks ago, two police cars and two animal control vehicles pulled up at the home of Stef'ny Steffen looking for her beloved 4-year-old pit bull, Xena. Seven officers hauled the animal off to the city shelter, putting her on death row.

Xena became an outlaw after Denver won a court fight and reinstated one of the toughest pit bull bans in the nation. Since May, more than 380 dogs have been impounded and at least 260 destroyed, an average of more than three a day.

Dog owners are in a panic. Some are using an underground railroad of sorts, sending their pets to live elsewhere or hiding them from authorities. City officials would not estimate how many people might be violating the ordinance.

Some owners, like Steffen, have won a reprieve for their pets with help from a rescue group. The group got Xena released by signing an affidavit stating that the animal would never return to Denver. The group took the dog to Mariah's Promise in Divide, an animal sanctuary that has accepted more than three dozen pit bulls from Denver.

For Steffen and her partner, Gina Black, leaving Xena 60 miles from home was a lousy option but the only one they had.

"It's safer than animal control. Safer than keeping her underground - at least she'll be able to play now," Steffen said. "But she'll miss us. We're her pack."

Denver is one of three major metropolitan areas, along with Miami and Cincinnati, to ban pit bulls, according to Glen Bui, vice president of the American Canine Foundation.

"Pit bull" typically describes three kinds of dogs: the American pit bull terrier, the American Staffordshire terrier and the Staffordshire bull terrier. But Denver's ban applies to any dog that looks like a pit bull. The animal's actual behavior does not matter.

City Councilman Charlie Brown said that in his judgment, "pit bulls are trained to attack. They're bred to do that."

Critics of the ban use words like "annihilation" and "genocide," and the city shelter has received e-mails likening animal control officers to Nazis.

"Breed bans are just a knee-jerk reaction to something that happened in the community," Bui said.

Denver banned pit bulls in 1989 after dogs mauled a minister and killed a boy in separate attacks. The Legislature passed a law in 2004 that prohibited breed-specific bans. The city sued, and a judge ruled in April the law was an unconstitutional violation of local control.

Critics of the ordinance say that a blanket ban on an entire breed is misguided and that the law should instead target irresponsible owners and all dangerous dogs.

"If anyone says one dog is more likely to kill - unless there's a study out there that I haven't seen - that's not based on scientific data," said Julie Gilchrist, a doctor at the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention who researches dog bites.

The CDC, the American Veterinary Medical Association and the Humane Society of the United States examined 20 years of dog-bite data and concluded that pit bulls and Rottweilers caused the most deaths.

But the researchers also noted that fatal attacks represent a small proportion of dog bite injuries and that the number of bites per breed simply seems to rise with their popularity.

At the city shelter, pit bulls are cordoned off from other dogs in what has become death row. Nearly 100 pit bulls have been released to live outside the county. A nonresident must guarantee the dog will never return to Denver."

QUOTE: Don't know if it's of any interest to anyone, don't really mean to bring up a huge debate regarding BSL again - mod's, feel free to lock this post if you so desire, but I thought it might at least be interesting reading: END

This makes me cry. I cannot imagine having this happen to my dogs. No, I don't happen to own these breeds, but I do know some very well, and they are family pets who have been in their families for years. I can't imagine what this would do to their owners. And here's the part that is most frightening to me: "Denver's ban applies to any dog that looks like a pit bull. The animal's actual behavior does not matter."

I live here in Denver and quite frankly have little sympathy for these people. They knew when the ban was lifted it wouldn't last and went out and got pits anyway. Now they are horrified. Aurora is considering it as well. This was NO suprise to anyone. Most pit owners here are extremely irrisponsible. They try to dump them off here at the kennel all the time.

QUOTE from Jeff Oehisen: I live here in Denver and quite frankly have little sympathy for these people. They knew when the ban was lifted it wouldn't last and went out and got pits anyway. Now they are horrified. Aurora is considering it as well. This was NO suprise to anyone. Most pit owners here are extremely irrisponsible. They try to dump them off here at the kennel all the time. END QUOTE

I understand there are more points of view than that of the responsible dog owner.

This part of the article frightens me most: "....... Denver's ban applies to any dog that looks like a pit bull. The animal's actual behavior does not matter."

 Quote:

And here's the part that is most frightening to me: "Denver's ban applies to any dog that looks like a pit bull. The animal's actual behavior does not matter."

Pretty scary considering about half the people who see my Boxer Elvis think he`s a pit.

QUOTE: Pretty scary considering about half the people who see my Boxer Elvis think he`s a pit. END

Yes! And not to beat it to death, but that now-famous "find the Pit Bull" grouping of a couple dozen no-trick photos of DIFFERENT BREED DOGS all look like Pit Bulls......to me, and to my vet's entire staff. I have not shown it to one dog person who could pick out the Pit Bull 1st, 2nd, or 3rd. Best, so far, was 5th. And the BSL says "anything that LOOKS LIKE a Pit" ???? Yikes!

Yes. It made me cry.

Wait till Aurora throws down the ban. Where do you think all the former Denver dogs went? People here are sick and tired of the pit problem. And yes I got the pit first try in the picture test. These poor dogs were bred to fight and it looks like thier time is almost up. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/mad.gif" alt="" /> Here in Colorado they truely believe that it is how they raise a dog is how they will come out. I have never seen so many unrealistic powderpuff foo-foo Pit owners in my life. Then we have our version of the "gangsta" Who fight thier dogs to the death on the outskirts of Aurora. My bet is that it will be a done deal either this time or next.

If you want to try it yourself here is the Find the Pitbull test. I thought it was the presa first time around. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/blush.gif" alt="" />

http://members.aol.com/radogz/find.html

Actually here`s a better one: http://www.pitbullsontheweb.com/petbull/findpit.html

QUOTE: Actually here`s a better one END

Ms. Goessman -- Yes, this is the one where I failed (miserably) to choose correctly, and so did every staff member at my vet's office.

And, in fact, the one picture every person chose somewhere in their three picks was not the correct one.

This is part of why I think BSL (meaning outright banning -- not necessarily registration, which may be a somewaht different matter) is a seriously flawed idea.

Even if you (meaning any member of this discussion board) were able to pick the picture on your first try, how many animal control officers would be able to? No slur at all on animal control officers, whose work I admire and respect...........but this kind of breed ID-ing just is not (and can't be) a job requirement. Just my opinion............