COLUMBUS, Ind. — Columbus is moving towards enacting an ordinance that would ban sales of cats, dogs and rabbits at local pet shops.
The Columbus City Council approved the ordinance on first reading with a 4-2 vote — ordinances require two readings to be approved. Republican city councilmen Tim Shuffett and Frank Miller voted against the legislation. Republican Councilman David Bush was absent and therefore did not vote.
The proposed ordinance states that no pet shop “shall sell, deliver, offer for sale, barter, auction, give away or otherwise transfer or dispose of cats, rabbits, or dogs.”
Pet shops would be allowed to collaborate with Animal Care Services or rescue groups and provide space for those groups to “showcase adoptable dogs, rabbits and cats,” according to the proposal. However, the pet shop would not have any ownership interest in the animals offered and would not receive a fee for providing the space, the proposal states.
Animal Care Services general manager Nicohl Birdwell Goodin said that the ordinance is meant to be “proactive” in regards to keeping harmful breeding operations — and stores that buy animals from them — out of the community.
“We do not have any stores that are currently selling dogs or cats,” she said. “They are all working with adoption groups and rescues currently. But given what we have seen going on in other areas in Indiana and in the county, puppy mills are coming into this area. And this is designed to hopefully stop an issue before it becomes a bigger one.”
She said that communities in Indiana and other states are enacting similar laws.
For more on this story, see Thursday’s Republic.
