Story By Debbi Baker | The San Diego Union-Tribune
A new bill aimed at saving the lives of dogs stuck in hot vehicles would allow Good Samaritans to break out car windows without facing civil penalties.
The measure authored by Assemblymen Marc Steinorth and Miguel Santiago, is called the “Right to Rescue Act.”
It would provide “legal immunity for a person who damages a car in a good faith effort to save an animal from dangerous conditions while trapped in a hot car.”
“All the time we hear about animals that are dying being trapped in hot cars,” said Steinorth to the Sacramento Bee. “These owners, they just don’t realize how hot it can get, and I wanted to create legislation that enables us to be proactive.”
AB 797 is sponsored by the Humane Society of the United States as well as the Los Angeles District Attorney.
You can read the full test of the measure here.
Last week Steinorth and bill supporters Assemblywomen Kristin Olsen and Ling Ling Chang took up residence in a car on a hot day and watched as the temperatures inside the vehicle soared.
They sat inside the vehicle on an 89 degree day for a sweltering 21 minutes as the temperature inside the car climbed to 108 degrees.
As the three lawmakers remarked about how they were drenched in sweat, which enables humans to cool off and is something a canine can’t do, Olsen said, “a dog would be dead by now.”
Some people think the measure is much needed. Others, like Debbie Tandoc of the NORCALGolden Retriever Club, said there must be have specific guidelines to protect what could be needless damage to property when an overzealous rescuer takes steps that aren’t needed, for instance when if an air conditioning is on and an animal looks like it’s in distress when it is not. “Animal rights people just go off their rocker with this sort of thing,” she told the Sacramento Bee.
But Steinorth said the bill will not allow people to just walk around with hammers breaking into cars.
“I hope we don’t have people who use this legislation as an excuse to randomly break windows,” Steinorth said, “but I just don’t think that’s going to happen. I think people are smarter than that.”
Read the full article at The San Diego Union-Tribune
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Story By Debbi Baker | The San Diego Union-Tribune
Debbi Baker is a reporter, writer of the “What’s Now” blog and Social Media Editor for the San Diego Union-Tribune, which she joined in 2002.
A native Californian who attended California State University Northridge, Baker started her news career at KGIL radio in Los Angeles, where she worked as a writer, producer, executive producer and program director. From there, she transitioned into television where she also wrote and produced news programming for KCAL TV. After moving to San Diego, she worked at KSDO radio and then KUSI TV, where she was the executive producer of morning news before joining the U-T. Baker has won several honors for her work, including several first place awards for daily reporting and writing from the local chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists.
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Photo Credit: “Thumper,” a 70-pound lab, sits in the backseat of a (not hot) car — Associated Press
