Cats are closer to achieving equal footing with dogs in New Hampshire, at least when it comes to their untimely demise.
But when it comes to a ban on getting their claws removed, they may have less luck in store.
House lawmakers last Thursday approved a bill that would require anyone who hits a cat with a vehicle to notify police or the animal’s owner as soon as possible. Such notification already is required when it comes to canine collisions. However, state law already views dogs and cats differently. Dogs are subject to leash laws and must be registered with a municipality. No such requirement exists for cats.
That bill now goes to the Senate, but three other bills related to killing animals won’t live on. Another’s fate is still uncertain.
A bill to ban the practice of declawing cats will have its day on the House floor this week.
On Wednesday, lawmakers will take up House Bill 1387. That bill would prohibit any attempt to remove a cat’s claws except in situations where it is medically necessary.
The proposed law would stop the removal of claws for “aesthetic reasons or for reasons of convenience in keeping or handling the cat.” The bill would impose a $500 fine on any veterinarian who carried it out.
Sponsored by Rep. Katherine Rogers, a Concord Democrat, the bill had attracted support from a national group, the Paw Project, which has sought to ban a practice that advocates say is hurtful.
“We’re talking about an amputation of a cat’s toes,” said Dr. Jennifer Conrad, the director of the Paw Project. “As a veterinarian, I went to school to protect cats. Not couches.”
But the effort encountered strong resistance from pet owners’ associations in New Hampshire, who predicted it would lead to more cats being sent to shelters if they cause damage in the home.
Supporters have said the data does not support that prediction.
Opponents also said that the law would unfairly deprive owners of choice.
“There’s a lot of emotion about the poor cat, and everything else,” said Joyce Arivella, former president of Dog Owners of the Granite State, an owners’ rights organization. “I love my cats, but I wouldn’t declaw them. But that doesn’t mean that I have the right to tell somebody else what they can do with their animal or they shouldn’t have it. That’s wrong.”
In a narrow, cross-party vote, the House Environment and Agriculture committee voted 12-8 to recommend that the bill be killed. Lawmakers in favor of killing it said that the procedure is rare and not allowing it could lead to euthanasia for some cats.
Lawmakers opposed said that the exemption for medically necessary situations is sufficient for most situations involving the owners and the cats.
The full House will take up the bill for a vote Wednesday morning at 10 a.m.
Previously, the House voted against a measure that would have repealed a prohibition on hunting with ferrets, another that would have created a safari hunting license for those taking elk and boar at a private game reserve and a third that would have lowered the bar for killing animals that damage crops or other property.
Current law allows someone to kill wild animals that cause “actual and substantial” damage. The failed bill would have removed the “and substantial” language.
As for ferrets, while hunters use the animals in other countries to flush rabbits out of burrows, the only ferrets legal in New Hampshire are domesticated and ill-suited to the outdoors.