This week, the New York City Council passed several bold measures that will make a tremendous, positive impact on animals big and small! The Council approved legislation to: 

• Encourage pet adoption.
• Protect wild birds.
• Ban the sale of force-fed poultry products (i.e., foie gras).
• Protect carriage horses from working in oppressive heat conditions by requiring that humidity is taken into account when measuring the air temperature.
• Establish a Mayor’s Office of Animal Welfare.
• Require the New York City Police Department (NYPD) to report animal cruelty data.

Several ASPCA staff members testified before the Council’s Health Committee in June in support of a number of these proposals. We thank the Council for listening to our testimony and for delivering victories for the city’s animals and concerned citizens.

Additionally, the City Council passed the following animal welfare-related “resolutions”—which are not laws, but rather official position statements and/or requests—targeting city, state or federal government: 

• A New York City-focused resolution to formalize the City’s support for “Meatless Mondays.” Mayor DeBlasio implemented Meatless Mondays throughout the city’s public school system this year.
• A state-focused resolution that expresses the City’s support for providing a tax credit to New Yorkers who adopt an animal from a shelter.
• The Council urged the U.S. Congress to pass the Preventing Animal Cruelty Torture (PACT) Act.

Finally, in an exciting win for our state-level efforts to crack down on puppy mills, the City Council passed a resolution vocalizing its firm support for the bill to shut down the puppy mill pipeline in New York by ending the sale of dogs, cats and rabbits in pet stores. This resolution asks lawmakers in Albany to pass the bill before the state’s session ends in 2020.

If you live in New York, you can help! Join the ASPCA Advocacy Brigade to be alerted when the NY Legislature is back in action—we’ll need your voice to get this historic bill over the finish line.