Recently, staff and volunteers from Marin Humane proudly represented our county at the state Capitol for Animal Advocacy Day. This annual event brings animal advocates from across the state to Sacramento for a day of meetings with legislators to advocate for a variety of important issues affecting pets, people and wildlife in the Golden State.

This year’s focus was on legislative bills in three main areas: closing the puppy mill pipeline; increasing access to veterinary care; and enhancing animal protection.

It’s common knowledge that puppies sold online often come from puppy mills. These operations not only keep animals in deplorable conditions, but they often sell sick dogs and sometimes, they simply scam the consumer out of their money, with no puppy ever arriving.

Assembly Bill 519 seeks to enhance oversight and accountability in online sales transactions. It focuses on transparency by requiring online pet brokers to disclose the original source of the animals and voiding contracts that fail to do so or require nonrefundable deposits. And Assembly Bill 506 would require a person selling, transporting or importing a dog into the state for the purpose of resale or change of ownership to obtain and submit a health certificate completed by a veterinarian and dated no more than 10 days before the date on which the dog is brought into the state.

One of the most significant challenges for pet guardians is access to veterinary care. With a nationwide shortage of veterinarians and skyrocketing costs, this crisis is only getting worse. Complicating this is the fact that state laws are unnecessarily stringent when it comes to providing veterinary treatment. Many routine exams and procedures can easily and safely be performed by registered veterinary technicians (RVTs) and even veterinary assistants, easing the bottleneck for essential care and saving money.

Assembly Bills 516 and 602 would increase access to affordable veterinary care by allowing RVTs to perform any animal health care not prohibited by law and would allow RVTs to administer vaccines and medications without a veterinarian present. This would be hugely helpful in easing the bottlenecks at veterinary practices, pop-up clinics and animal shelters that don’t always have a veterinarian on-site.

And while we don’t hear about it often, cockfighting is still a major issue in California. “Despite California’s strong cockfighting laws, the USDA has estimated that cockfighting is a multi-million-dollar criminal industry that involves more than 3 million birds statewide. The three largest cockfighting seizures in U.S. history were all recently in California,” said Assemblymember Chris Rogers.

This blood sport — like all others — is simple animal cruelty. It’s also closely linked to gambling and drug trafficking. Rogers has introduced Assembly Bill 928 to address this issue by prohibiting a person from keeping or raising more than three roosters per acre, or 25 roosters total on any property, except as specified. This measure exempts commercial poultry operations, poultry hobbyists, schools, animal agencies and FFA and 4H projects.

California leads the way in animal welfare so we’re hopeful these important bills will pass. If you’d like to add your voice, please contact your local representative. Not sure who they are? Visit findyourrep.legislature.ca.gov.

Lisa Bloch is the marketing and communications director for Marin Humane, which contributes Tails of Marin and welcomes questions and comments from the community. Visit marinhumane.org, find us on social media @marinhumane, or email lbloch@marinhumane.org.