By Kathy Chaffin
kchaffin@salisburypost
The current economic conditions may prevent the N.C. General Assembly from passing Davie’s Law/Humane Euthanasia in Shelters óHouse Bill 6 and Senate Bill 199 banning carbon monoxide gas chamber euthanasia for cats and dogs.
Rep. Fred Steen, R-Rowan, said the Rowan Animal Shelter is not set up to do the lethal injection method of euthanasia called for in the bills.
“It would take capital investments and additional operational costs to sustain such a process,” he said. “For us to make a state law without funding is an unfunded mandate, and I oppose it for that reason.”
Steen has viewed both euthanasia methods, the carbon monoxide gas chamber at the Rowan shelter and the lethal injection of sodium pentobarbital at Charlotte-Mecklenburg Animal Care and Control. “I am convinced that gas is just as humane if done properly,” he said.
Steen said he had received very few calls from constituents in favor of House Bill 6.
Rep. Lorene Coates, D-Rowan, said House Bill 6 has been heard, but not yet voted on. The Davie’s Law legislation, introduced in the State House by Rep. Cary Allred of Burlington, is named after a puppy that survived a carbon monoxide gas chamber and was later found alive in a trash bag in a dumpster.
The legislation would require all of North Carolina’s animal shelters to euthanize unwanted cats and dogs by lethal injections of sodium pentobarbital or an equivalent, or oral ingestion of the drug.
Coates said, “I think probably lethal injection is more humane, but what concerns me are the feral cats.” Trying to euthanize them by lethal injection could endanger animal shelter employees, she said.
“We’re not talking about cats and dogs that people have at their houses,” she said. “We’re talking about ones that are wild. We’re talking about the ones that have temperament problems.”
Coates said the legislation is being debated in committee. “They’re saying that lethal injection is probably cheaper,” she said. “I really don’t know that. I just listen to the debates …”
“Of course, I think it would be more humane if people would have them spayed and neutered instead of letting them reproduce and putting their babies out on the road. That’s horrible.”
Coates said House Bill 27, which would restrict the carbon monoxide gas chamber method of euthanasia to wildlife, was voted down in the House last week.
Sen. Andrew Brock, who represents Rowan and Davie counties in the N.C. Senate, said the state may not have the money that it would take counties presently using the carbon monoxide gas chamber method of euthanasia to switch over to lethal injection.
Brock said the state is already more than $3 billion in debt. “And I think it will go up to almost $4 billion …” he said. “Family budgets are hurting. City and county budgets are hurting. The state is hurting. The federal budget is hurting, but they print their own cash up there.”
About a third of the state’s 104 animal shelters, including Rowan’s, currently use the carbon monoxide gas chamber method.
New rules set by the Veterinary Division of the N.C. Department of Agriculture and Consumer Affairs, however, will require shelters which use the chamber method to euthanize cats and dogs that are under the age of 16 weeks, pregnant or near death from sickness or injury by lethal injection.
Dr. Lee Hunter, director of the Veterinary Division, said the rules are likely to go into effect in August, after all animal shelter employees have had time to be retrained in both methods.
Brock said the debate over which method of euthanasia is the most humane is a tough issue.
“I think the lethal injection method is better,” he said, adding however, that he can appreciate the argument that it’s safer for animal shelter staff to euthanize feral animals by the carbon monoxide gas chamber method.
“It’s like, ‘How can we do it the best way possible for the safety of the workers?’ I worry about carbon monoxide poisoning with them,” he said, “and on the other hand, I worry about them dealing with the huge burden of those very wild animals that they have to deal with.”
Brock said he thinks most people believe the lethal injection method is more humane, but said he is not sure there is enough money for counties to switch over right now. “We would hope that everybody would make the move toward it,” he said.
What would be great, he said, is if animal organizations would help counties apply for grant money to make the switch. “Somebody said if they want something, what they’re willing to pay for is a whole lot easier to get,” he said. “We have people who say, ‘We want this, we want that and make the taxpayers pay.’
“Right now we don’t have the money. We can’t.”
Contact Kathy Chaffin at 704-797-4249.