IL: HSUS is fine with killing shelter dogs, as long as a syringe is involved

Brady backs off bill allowing mass killing of shelter animals

February 24, 2010
BY DAVE McKINNEY Springfield Bureau Chief

SPRINGFIELD — The GOP’s likely nominee for governor, state Sen. Bill Brady, came under fire Wednesday from a leading animal-rights group for pushing legislation to allow the mass killing of stray shelter animals in gas chambers.

Brady (R-Bloomington) introduced the legislation sought by an animal-control facility in his district on Feb. 2, two days after the GOP gubernatorial primary that he now leads.

State Sen. Bill Brady (R-Bloomington) introduced legislation sought by an animal-control facility in his district earlier this month to allow the mass killing of stray shelter animals in gas chambers.


But he gutted the legislation Wednesday and turned it over to another sponsor after the Humane Society of the United States condemned the measure and characterized the procedure as cruel.

“A constituent asked me to do it, and I have an obligation to represent my constituents,” Brady said. “I was never for it, but I thought it was a subject that deserved discussion.

“But the politics surrounding me being the nominee created an environment that’s more attack mode than discussion mode, so we shelled the bill,” he said.

The legislation, first tipped in the Capitol Fax newsletter, would have undone a compromise reached last year between the Humane Society, veterinarians and the state Department of Agriculture that allows for one animal to be killed at a time in a carbon monoxide chamber.

“I have no idea why Sen. Brady introduced a bill that would allow as many animals as you want to be put into a gas chamber and they’d be exposed to one another,” said Jordan Matyas, the Humane Society’s state director.

“Under his legislation, you could have 10 dogs in one box, gasping for air, at the same time fighting, at the same time fearing for their lives,” said Matyas, whose group has more than 400,000 members in Illinois. “Even if the animals are separated, you still have to run the gas chamber 20 to 40 minutes, which takes a lot more time than an injection.”

McLean County Animal Control in Brady’s hometown of Bloomington has one of at least two of the machines now in use in Illinois and sought Brady’s support for loosening the state law enacted last year capping the number of animals that can be gassed at any one time.

The Bloomington agency’s machine is capable of killing four animals at a time — aggressive dogs or cats that threaten people and don’t “end up at the Humane Society’s door,” said Erin Tolle Link, a spokeswoman for the McClean County Health Department.

“There’s no way to fit 10 dogs in ours,” Tolle Link said, noting that each animal has its own individual chamber and the shelter also euthanizes by lethal injection. “As far as them gasping for air, it’s a humane process. It’s as simple as usually they hear the noise of air going out, and carbon monoxide coming in . . .then they pass.”

Brady backs off bill allowing mass killing of shelter animals :: CHICAGO SUN-TIMES :: Politics