In 2003 West Hollywood passed an ordinance forbidding veterinarians from declawing domestic cats for non-medical reasons. The city felt it was a cruel practice. When cats are "declawed" the veterinarian just chops off the last digit of the cats' toes.

Veterinarians make a lot of money selling this cruel and unnecessary surgery to uninformed cat owners. The CVMA sued the City of West Hollywood in 2005 claiming they had no authority to regulate their own actions. CVMA lost their lawsuit. The California Supreme Court refused to hear the appeal in 2007 ruling that West Hollywood had the right to prohibit cruel declaw surgeries within its borders.

The CVMA tried to get around this city ordinance by proposing California state bill AB2427. This bill would make it illegal for cities or counties to regulate any businesses or professionals licensed at the state level. This means that anyone could violate numerous city and county laws if they had a state license of any type. Contractors could do loud construction all night long if they had a contractor's license. They would be exempt from city noise ordinances. It sounds crazy but that is the can of worms that is AB2427.

This bill is currently opposed by the California State Association of Counties, the League of California Cities and animal activists. The bill will be heard by the Senate Business, Professions, and Economic Development Committee on Monday, June 23. Let your legislators know that you oppose AB 2427, and ask them to vote against this bill without delay. Calls expressing opposition must be made immediately. Please, contact the members of the committee here

http://www.senate.ca.gov/ftp/sen/committee/STANDING/BUSINESS/_home1/PROFILE.HTM

To learn more about declawing, go here

http://www.stopdeclaw.com

To learn more about the bill and who voted for it, go here

http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/cgi-bin/postquery?bill_number=ab_2427&sess=CUR&house=B&author=eng

To see which politicians accepted money from CVMA , go here

http://cal-access.ss.ca.gov/Campaign/Committees/Detail.aspx?id=1022620&session=2007&view=contributions