When A “Service Dog” Is Really A Service Dog.

The Americans with Disability Act (ADA) defines service dog or assistance animal in vague enough terms to allow for irresponsible dog owners to abuse the provisions of the law for their own selfish purposes.

The two main stumbling stones are the clause that a person claiming to be disabled cannot be asked anything about the nature of his disability. Nor can such an individual be asked to produce any documentation that proves a disability.

The second issue that facilitates abuse of ADA by reckless people is a challengers inability to inquire about the 'specific service' the alleged service animal does indeed perform to assist his owner.

Even an elephant sized service animal could slip through this one.

Pet owners who desire to elevate the status of their pet can use both with impunity. It is virtually impossible to doubt or challenge the status of anyone who claims to be disabled because there is no official proof of disability issued. And even if there were an official document, nobody could ask to see it because ADA expressly forbids such an inquiry. This constitutes a perfect charter for abuse.

No it does not, you say? Because many websites on the Internet will gladly provide an ID card for disabled people. Sure, they will be happy to sell you one for a handsome price. The only problem is that these ID cards are hardly worth the paper they are printed on. They prove nothing. They are not official documents attesting to a medical fact and thus conferring legal rights. They affirm only that their bearer was gullible enough to hand over money for a worthless document or wildly determined to commit fraud.

Nevertheless, many a store owner and landlord will back down when a “disabled” person voluntarily flashes such a phony document in front of their eyes. After all, store owners or managers hate to lose paying customers. And landlords are afraid of being sued for discrimination by an enraged tenant or by prospective tenants.

Most battles, if not all, over service dogs are lost by challengers right at this stage. One cannot ask the challenge question and, even if a person could, they are precluded from asking for proof. Classic Catch 22 situation. Or a no win – no win dilemma.

Consequently, it becomes an academic question what specific service the service dog performs to assist his owner or to alleviate some impairment of his master.

But even if one could ask for an explanation (and possibly demonstration), matters would not change significantly because some of the disabilities included in the revised catalog are so vaguely defined or described that they offer little guidance.

Among the most annoying and most often abused is the purported need of a service animal for emotional support. Though emotional support dogs do not qualify as service dogs, too many medical professionals bow to pressure from patients and write a letter declaring a need for the dog in order to keep the patient emotionally stable.

In the hands of reckless people these letters become an endless source of trouble inconveniencing everyone who is unfortunate enough to be present when a selfish dog owner is forcing the service dog issue.

Do not misunderstand me, dogs can be of great assistance and importance in certain medical situations, such as when a dog has the ability to sniff out cancer or to sense and alert to an impending seizure. But that is a far cry from an owner claiming to suffer from anxiety when the animal is not there.

All breeds and sizes of dogs can successfully serve as 'medical' service dogs, while the more traditional fields of assistance animals is dominated by larger dogs. However, more small dogs fall into the category of nuisance dogs – not service dogs.

How does one recognize possible impostors? Actually it is rather easy. A small dog in a shoulder bag is almost certainly not a service dog, especially if it barks incessantly. The same is true for smallish dogs on a flex leash darting ahead of their owner and from side to side even in a store. That's a nuisance but not a trained service dog. And a trip hazard.

Any dog, flex leash or not, large or small, that relives himself inside a store or building is not a service dog. The animal lacks one of the main requirements for a service animal that is allowed to accompany his owner everywhere. Same is true for barking, intense desire to contact people, constant whining, leaving the side of his handler or other signs of impatience.

Service dogs, trained service dogs, are invariably trained to be good canine citizens – not sources of noise and nuisances on four legs – or in a bag. They are not fashion accessories.

“Service dogs” that can be easily placed in one of the categories above, especially when they are making a 'nuisance' out of themselves by barking, relieving themselves, bothering people, knocking over things in a store, interfering with food and are not controlled by their owners, can – and deserve – to be removed. This is true even if the dog actually IS a service dog.

As we near the end of Part 2 of this series of articles on problems related to service dogs, we have successfully identified some main sources for problems with service dogs and their acceptance by the public in public places:

- The lack of clear definitions and criteria of a service dog in ADA.

- The lack of official confirmation and proof of the disabled status of an individual, which is essential to determine whether an animal is a service or assistance dog.

- The lack of clearly defined training requirements, demonstrated by passing a test administered by an impartial entity. Wannabe Internet service dog training facilities that issue service dog certificates (without performing any training at all) and disabled owner IDs do not count.

- The lack of proper official identification for the disabled person and for the service dog.

- The lackluster desire of property owners, store managers and other parties in control of public places to challenge the legal status of an alleged service animal.

- The abundance of dubious, worthless documents that pretend to certify disabled and dog alike by the owners of pet stores and pet relate websites.

In combination these abuses will eventually result in tighter, stricter controls on what is and what is not a service dog to the detriment of all persons who really need a service animal.

But there is still time to prevent the worst.

Let us see how in Part 3 of this series.

PJJ

Service Animals And The TSA

What to expect when taking your service dog on an airplane.

The airport is one of the places where you can expect close attention to your service dog. It is better to be prepared than to be sorry. Proper preparation begins with the knowledge of what to expect and how to adjust to it.

Check out the following official advice and rules that the TSA has published on their website:

“General

• If you have a service animal, you are encouraged to inform the TSO that the animal accompanying you is a service animal and not a pet.  This will provide you with an opportunity to move to the front of the screening line since the TSO may need to spend more time with you.
• It is recommended that persons using an animal for assistance carry appropriate identification.  Identification may include: cards or documentation, presence of a harness or markings on the harness, or other credible assurance of the passenger using the animal for their disability.
• At no time during the screening process will you be required to be separated from your service animal.
• TSOs have been trained not to communicate, distract, interact, play, feed, or pet service animals.
• The TSO should ask permission before touching your service animal or its belongings.
• You must assist with the inspection process by controlling the service animal while the TSO conducts the search.   You are required to maintain control of the animal in a manner that ensures the animal cannot harm the TSO.
• If you need to leave the sterile area to relieve your animal, you must undergo the full screening process again.  Inform the TSO upon your return to the security checkpoint and she/him will move you to the front of the screening line to expedite the screening process.

Service Dogs

• Advise the TSO how you and your dog can best achieve screening when going through the metal detector as a team (i.e., whether walking together or with the service animal walking in front of or behind you).
• If the WTMD alarms in the situation where you and the animal have walked together, both you and the dog must undergo additional screening.
• If the WTMD alarms on either you or the dog individually (because you walked through separately), additional screening must be conducted on whoever alarmed the WTMD.
• If the dog alarms the WTMD, the TSO will ask the PWD’s permission and assistance before they touch the dog and its belongings.  The TSO will then perform a hand inspection of the dog and its belongings (collar, harness, leash, backpack, vest, etc.)  The belongings will not be removed from the dog at any time.”

Now you know what to expect from TSA. Based on these official rules it is easy to foresee potential complications and to prepare for them. First and foremost among them is to establish without doubt that your dog is indeed a service animal and not just a pet impersonating an assistance animal.

In my opinion this is best accomplished by foregoing the easy way of using ADA provisions and some dubious Internet service dog patch or harness for a registered official State or local service dog license.

Not all states issue these licenses and your dog must take and pass a test to establish its function as a true, recognized service dog. But it is well worth having such a state sponsored service dog license, because not even police or any other authority can now question the status of your dog as a service animal.

You and your service dog must also comply with airline policies that vary from carrier to carrier. Some ask you to call and advise the airline that you will be traveling with a service dog. Most will allow your service animal to sit with you in the aircraft as long as the dog can sit in front of your feet or under the seat. Dogs that do not meet this requirement may have to travel in the cargo hold unless you buy a second ticket to accommodate your dog. Whenever possible most airlines will give you a bulkhead seat that allows more room for a dog.

I will talk about and explain state and local service dog rules in the second part of my article on service dogs (see The Problem with Service Dogs for part I.)

Oh, I know. Supporters of ADA rules, mainly those that sell harnesses, tags, dubious IDs and so-called service dog training, never fail to state that federal law supersedes state and local law. But they also conveniently forget to mention that state and local laws trump federal law when the regional provisions are stricter than federal rules regarding service dogs.

Many of them are indeed more exacting. Others also include extended legal protection for the service animal in their Penal Code. California for example incorporates both in state law regarding service dogs.

PJJ

The Problem with Service Dogs

How many 'service dogs' have you seen recently?

With impressive harness and large 'service dog' tag?

Many of them are small dogs riding around in pouches, shoulder bags and purses.

I daresay that many, if not most, of the service dog tags sported by these animals are actually the cheap kind you can buy on the Internet for around $ 6.00 – with certification that this animal is a service dog. No certification test needed or taken. Instead buyers get a small card advising anyone who cares to challenge the owner of the service dog what the federal service dog law, ADA version, provides.

These tags are dubious at best, if not outright fraudulent. There is not even an attempt to verify that the dog is indeed trained as a service dog AND that the owner is disabled.

The ID cards that advise about the law are phony as well. The issuing agencies have fancy names that sound official or even purport to be training facilities. I have seen some that give only a very general outline on how a dog should be trained. No actual training takes place despite the fact that the facilities claim to be training facilities.

The overwhelming majority are not. Just money making enterprises. Or fronts for puppy mills or online pet stores.

ADA facilitated service dogs

There are several ways a dog can become a service dog. The most commonly used method is to apply the provisions of the Americans with Disabilities Act. This federal law defines 'service dog' less accurately and more broadly than many State and local laws and regulations pertaining to service dogs.

.
Under current federal law a dog can be a service dog

- if his/her owner is disabled and

- the animal performs a specific service, often a physical task, for the owner. Listed are, among others, pulling a wheel chair, fetching a phone, picking up dropped items and turning lights on or off, to name a few.

That's pretty straight forward. It conjures up images of seeing eye dogs and of a large dog pulling a wheelchair. Not much room for misleading manipulation there. Problems arise when non-physical factors are used to justify a dog's position as service dog.

For example, giving passive emotional support does not qualify a dog as a service dog. These animals are emotional support dogs and as such not covered by ADA rules. Emotional support dogs are usually not trained to perform certain physical tasks for their emotionally affected owners. Dogs that give only emotional comfort to a person or visit and interact with the infirm are therapy dogs and not service dogs.

Therapy dogs do not have the privileges of a service dog.

In order to qualify as a service dog the canine must be trained to act specifically on specific behavioral patterns or behavior displayed by his emotionally challenged owner, such as with the onset of serious depression.

Dogs trained to do so often called psych dogs.

They respond to great sadness or sustained crying of their owners by licking face and the tears.

That is a far cry from a dog sitting on the couch or in the car or on an airplane doing nothing but what a dog normally would do without special training.

The problem with the ADA service dogs

1. Self-certified 'handicap'.

Only licensed medical professionals or institutions can declare a person handicapped as part of a formal diagnosis and medical findings.

Yet, if a person points to his dog and claims it to be a service dog, he cannot be challenged as to his or her disability. ADA does not allow that.

So, it is all self-policed.

2. Self-certified specific service

When challenged the disabled owner of a 'service dog' does not necessarily have to explain what specific service the dog is performing, since nobody can lawfully inquire about the nature of the owner's disability.

Virtually all website that have service dog tag and harnesses for sale make it a point to emphasize that prohibition. Only the police may have the right to look more closely into the nature of the disability, if any, and to check the truth of the facts claimed.

The result?

Rampant abuse of the service dog status. Much of it is based on some vague statement by some sort of medical practitioner that the dog is needed for emotional support of his owner.

Go to any grocery store, airline check line, taxi service or any other facility frequented by people and you will find the proverbial Chihuahua riding in a shoulder bag or other small dogs lifting a leg on the groceries. Ask landlords about their experiences with 'service' dogs and their belligerent owners.

Therefore many owners of true service dogs get challenged by store managers and tailed by security guards while in a store. They are keeping a leery eye on the dog looking for any transgression that might serve as a convenient reason to eject the animal from the facility for creating a nuisance.

The authors of ADA and the service dog provisions therein

• envisioned large dog performing physical services for their owners. The laws were written with Seeing Eye Dogs in mind not to deliver excuses to take a dog in a bag on an airplane or to a grocery store,
• had in mind training and certification efforts similar to those of certified Seeing Eye Dogs,
• assumed the integrity and honesty of a truly handicapped person.

They did not think of dogs as fashion statements and couched as 'service dogs'.

In reality cheating is rampant.

It is supported by individuals who derive income from offering phony service dog implements, claim to train dogs and so to certify them, misrepresent legal requirements service dogs must meet in order to cater to a clientèle that cheats outright.

Most these owners are not handicapped at all, have no trained service dog that can perform any specific service for them other than just being a pet. But that does not make for a service dog. A pet is a pet.

These owners are making a mockery out of the status as service dog.

They are only looking for a way to take their dog places where they do not belong or to find a way to defeat a landlord who does not allow dogs on his property.

Backlash

The actions of a minority of irresponsible and selfish people are creating a backlash from retailers and other entities because of the high number of bad experiences with untrained, small noisy dogs that pee in grocery stores and bark up a storm. As a consequence, true service dogs also get hassled by managers, security guards and other interested personnel.

Should honest handicapped people be inconvenienced and forced to fight every time they need to take their dog because of the abuse perpetrated by an ever growing minority of selfish pet lovers who abuse a well-meant system?

What should and can be done about this deplorable situation?

I will answer this question in the second part of this article.

PJJ

Service Dog Duty Is A Challenge

One last report involving the life and times of the founder before we move on to present day challenges for all service dogs. Among the many abandoned dogs Windsor helped rescue and rehabilitate was Leila, an American Bulldog girl that was surrendered to the pound by her 'celebrity' owner. Next to Beth, the meat grinder on paws, she was one of the more memorable dogs Windsor served. Read the story of her rehabilitation one more time.

"Leila was on death row as well.  Windsor took her in for a few precious weeks. When she arrived at his home, complete with bed, warm blankets and food, Windsor immediately confiscated her brand new bed. She moved on the floor.

Here she is wistfully looking at her bed that is now occupied by King Windsor.

     



 







After long days on probation, the persistent smart
girl   finally managed to rest her head on the bed.                                                                  
                                                                                                                                    












This happens when you give the devil the tip of your small finger. He will take the whole hand.











End of story?
No.

                                                                                                                                   

Behold the powers of a determined Bulldog girl!









Wait! It gets even better. This lady is determined to repossess her bed despite the occupant.  Her mission in life is reconquista of the bed.







Success!
 She finally wormed herself onto her own bed as an equal partner.
Two kindred souls, one shared bed.
 Blessed are those who find peace and affection on a shared bed.





From the world of Hip Hop to a wet, dirty concrete floor in an animal shelter, to a soft, warm bed in a home this Bulldog Lady has come a long way.
A little celebratory embrace is justified. Don't you think so?
Honi soit qui mal y pense!

JL

Remembering a true service dog.

Here is Windsor King MacArthur with one of his charges. He saved her from death row where her former owner (a celebrity) had put her, took her brand new bed away and rehabilitated her. She found a new home of her own  -  after she wormed her way back unto her bed.

 PS: This is NOT a posed picture!

A New Year, a New Beginning - Calling all working and service dogs.

The old blog 'Lucysvoice . . .' is gone. Enter Working Service Dog Post, a new regular publication that focuses on the needs and sometimes the pleas of service and working dogs with particular emphasis on establishing, improving and protecting their legal status and their standing in our society by showing the palette of important services they perform, promoting higher standards for training, qualification and certification, by arguing for improved protection, and by combating the rampant abuse facilitated by the present code of laws.

Windsor, the late founder of the 'Lucysvoice . . .', crossed the rainbow bridge while on duty as a service dog. An unofficial service dog, I hasten to add. He never bothered to qualify and to get certified. He did not even own one of those phony 6 dollar service dog patches sold to anyone on the Internet.

He simply served his family and, most importantly fellow canines in desperate need of rescue, assistance and rehabilitation. He was well known and respected in many urban shelters.

So much so that when he decided to retire forever at the end of a long day helping two Mastiffs leave the blighted yard of an abandoned house despite of being himself confined to a wheelchair, his own vet secured him a safe and free passage over the rainbow bridge. A commercial crematorium offered to cremate him at a rate and with the ceremonial honors reserved for police service dogs. Another shelter at which he had assisted many good dogs with a very bad but undeserved reputation honored his selfless service by cremating him for free.

Why the mention?

Because first of all it shows that it does not necessarily take formal training for a dog to be a true service dog. It takes the right character and personality and the opportunity to use the God given talent. Good Samaritans are not produced in Samaritan schools. They are born that way.

Not all dogs have the gift to be service dogs, even fewer yet are blessed with the faculties that make an outstanding service dog.

Windsor had it all. During the last five years of his long life he showed me how to identify troubled powerful, difficult dogs, rehabilitate them and guide them into a new life as trusted family members.

His judgment was uncanny. He never failed to identify those worthy of redemption and to nip at the hopelessly evil.

Windsor King MacArthur on his throne.

His reassuring presence, his example made me realize the invaluable services true service dogs perform day after day without question and complaints.

These working service dogs are the unsung heroes of the dog world: Working dogs guarding the life and the property of their owners, performing physical tasks while assisting challenged handlers, detecting harmful and illicit substances, pulling loads and performing specific services that assist the disabled.

Many are called but few are chosen. Those who are can lead a privileged life during their working years as cherished members of a small 'family' unit. They also enjoy the respect of society at large.

But there is a problem.

It comes in the form of the ever increasing number of impostors.

Read more about this danger in the second part of this article.

PJJ