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House Co-Sponsorship Memoranda
House of Representatives
Session of 2023 - 2024
Regular Session
MEMORANDUM
| Posted: | March 16, 2023 02:09 PM |
|---|---|
| From: | Representative Nick Pisciottano and Rep. Jason Ortitay |
| To: | All House members |
| Subject: | Helping Law Enforcement Combat Animal Fighting |
| Pennsylvania takes animal fighting seriously and the Commonwealth has had one of the toughest animal fighting laws in the country for decades now. These laws can only be effective, however, when they are properly enforced. Organized animal fighting at the highest levels is driven by illegal gaming with purses running into the millions with millions more earned through breeding, training and equipment. These perpetrators are well-funded, smart, and able to use the internet and coded language to hide fight locations, training facilities, and illegal transactions. Pennsylvania’s animal cruelty laws are enforced primarily by nonprofit humane society police officers and rarely is there more than one operating in a county. Local law enforcement is similarly overburdened in many places and lacks the funding to undertake a deep and detailed investigation into these rings despite the expert support offered by national animal welfare organizations. Pennsylvania gaming law provides for a $2 million annual transfer to a fund to provide law enforcement grants to combat unlawful gaming. Our proposed legislation will expressly permit this existing funding to be applied to combating any violation of our animal fighting law. The legislation does not mandate that grants to combat animal fighting be approved, but it allows our law enforcement agencies the opportunity to access this funding to combat animal fighting if it is happening in their community. By connecting law enforcement to this anti-gambling funding we can provide the resources needed to effectively enforce the Commonwealth's animal cruelty laws. Please join us in co-sponsoring this legislation to fight both illegal gambling and animal fighting in Pennsylvania. |
Introduced as HB642