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Maine Bill Aims to Set Guidelines on 'Service Animals'

AUGUSTA, Maine - Resting service dogs kept a watchful eye on members of the Legislature's Agriculture, Conservation and Forestry Committee today as their owners weighed in on a bill aimed at setting clearer guidelines on what qualifies as a "service animal" under Maine law.

Supporters say the bill comes in response to complaints about poorly-trained therapy animals.
 
About a half-dozen canines rested comfortably at the hearing before the Legislature's Agriculture, Conservation and Forestry Committee, as Rep. Karl Ward, of Dedham, testified about a growing number of people who just aren't following the rules governing service animals.

"In a number of incidents the use of poorly trained, poorly behaved and ineffective service animals has created issues in places of businesses and residences," Ward said, "and in many cases the individual using a service animal has fraudulently claimed the need or training of the animal - even to the point of placing illegitimate service animal identification on their four-legged friend."

Although service animals are recognized and protected under the Maine Human Rights Act, Ward and other supporters of the bill say it's not always easy for apartment owners and business and building security teams, to tell the difference between true service animals, emotional support animals and pets that people take with them wherever they go.

Ward says Maine needs to ensure that the animals are trained to provide the services that their owners claim, so the bill would create a commission of business representatives, disabled Mainers and other stakeholders to develop recommendations for service animal certification requirements.

Ward's bill is supported by Rep. Will Tuell, a Republican from East Machias, who happens to be sight impaired. "It is not mean spirited or anti-disabled rights to be in support of this kind of legislation," Tuell said. "I said then, and I will say now, speaking as one who is legally blind and who has been through that war before."

"There are big problems with service animals here in Maine," said Dan Bernier. Bernier represents the Central Maine Apartment Owners Association. He says landlords everywhere in the state are finding that's it's increasingly difficult to balance the needs of all tenants in cases where the building does not allow pets, but an exemption is sought for a service animal.

"We've had a landlord forced to put a horse on a small in-town lot," Bernier said. "We had another landlord recently who said someone called and said you have a 'no pets' policy. They said, 'Yes.' And they said, 'Well I have a service animal.' The landlord mailed them an application, the same as they would any other tenant even after they knew they had a service animal. But the tenant doesn't fill out the application. Instead they just go file a complaint immediately with the Human Rights Commission."

And Amy Snierson, executive director of the Maine Human Rights Commission, says she's becoming increasingly familiar with the service animal debate. "When there are complaints about service animals, generally speaking they come to us."

And more of them come every year.  Snierson told the committee that the number of complaints from Mainers with service animals has tripled over the past two years, rising from seven in 2012 to 21 in 2014. She's received 15 so far this year alone.

Roberta Manter, of Fayette, who spoke neither for nor against the proposed bill, acknowledges that it can sometimes be hard for business owners to judge service animals by appearance.

"You walk in with a legitimate seeing eye dog and everyone can pretty much tell it's a legitimate seeing eye dog," Manter said. "But you walk in looking fine on the outside and nobody knows that, without that dog there with you, you might be a basket case - or you might have another problem, such as a severe allergy or seizures or any of these other things."

Maine already has a law that makes it a Class E crime to falsely claim that a pet is a legitimate service animal, but the committee was told that it is rarely - if ever - enforced. There are also federal policies in place that define true service animals, as distinguished from pets that provide comfort.