AURORA | Voters will decide, again, whether Aurora should ban pit bull dogs from the city, resurrecting a controversy that has hounded the community for almost 20 years.
The pit bull ban in Aurora was initially enacted in 2005 with some leniency for people the city had previously issued a license. In 2014, voters approved a referendum to keep the ban. In 2021, however, Aurora City Council approved the removal of dog breed restrictions from the city ordinance — without going back to voters for permission.
Later in 2021, Aurora resident Matthew Snider sued the Aurora City Council over the vote because it did not include voter support. He argued that the council broke city charter language and that Aurora voters decided the issue, and must decide any changes. By 2023, the Colorado Court of Appeals ruled in favor of Snider.
So, Aurora lawmakers are asking voters whether the city should repeal the restricted breed ban and allow residents to own American Pit Bull Terriers, American Staffordshire Terriers and Staffordshire Bull Terriers.
Here’s what you need to know about the pit bull ban ballot question.
What does a YES vote mean?
Yes, you want to allow people to own pit bulls in Aurora. You support repealing the breed ban and allowing residents to own American Pit Bull Terriers, American Staffordshire Terriers, and Staffordshire Bull Terriers within the city limits of Aurora.
What does a NO vote mean?
No, you do not want to allow pit bulls in Aurora. You support maintaining the breed ban that prevents residents from owning American Pit Bull Terriers, American Staffordshire Terriers, and Staffordshire Bull Terriers within the city limits of Aurora.
Veterinarian stance
“We had a big moment of panic when we saw that the repeal had been overturned because we do see a big difference when we have breed-specific legislation on the books,” said Senior Director of Advocacy and Education at the Dumb Friends League Ali Mickelson, “but they are not enforcing that ban right now. So we haven’t felt that yet, but we are preparing for it.”
She said that when there is a breed-specific ban, there is an influx of the banned breed brought to the shelter, and it is very challenging to find them new homes.
Many shelters are usually already at maximum capacity, so having a breed-specific ban overwhelms shelters with finding placement for them. Mickelson said that many shelters are moving away from destroying unwanted dogs, and Colorado shelters have an strong network for moving animals.
When there was a pit-bull ban in Denver, and Aurora was fully implementing its breed-specific ban, the shelter would have to label the kennels, warning people that they might live in a place with a ban on that breed.
“We have these families that come in, and they’re so excited to find out more about a dog, and then they find out that they can’t adopt that dog because of the restrictions in their community,” Mickelson said. “It just results in us having dogs that stay longer.”
Denver Dumb Friends League sits at the border of Aurora and Denver. When there was a ban in both cities, Mickelson said they had difficulty finding homes for those breeds.
“When those two communities had those bans, that just really, really limited our doctors for those breeds,” she said.
Missing data
Mickelson said finding usable data from the Denver Dumb Friends League involving Denver’s breed-specific ban was unreliable because the ban coincided with COVID-19 lockdowns.
“People were adopting more and relinquishing less, and so it’s not a great sample size, but I can definitely speak about it generally,” Mickelson said.
Mickelson said it can be hard to distinguish whether a dog is a pit bull which seems to be a common finding nationally.
“You know, we’re not DNA testing any of these animals,” she said. ““This is one of the big conversations nationally, and why breed-specific legislation is being overturned, and is really not very popular with most animal welfare organizations is because it’s really hard to tell by looking at a dog.”
Even dogs with a portion of pit bull could be considered under the ban, and it is hard for veterinarians to distinguish whether a dog had a half or a quarter pit bull in them.
“That’s another weird data skew,” Mickelson said.
Most dog-bite data comes from plastic surgery data or police records. If pit bulls are hard to distinguish for vets, police officers or victims of a dog attack might not accurately determine the breed that attacked them.
Lori R Kogan, a Ph.D. psychologist and professor of clinical sciences at Colorado State University, found the same problem in her study.
She said most veterinarians she talked to in her study could not distinguish a pit bull. Kogan also found that public education about animal welfare and animal behavior was a more supported alternative than breed-specific bans.
“That’s one of the reasons doing specific legislation is not a great way to protect people from dangerous dogs,” Mickelson said.
Mickelson also added that when there is a ban, dog owners of that breed are less likely to get the resources they might need, like behavioral training or shoots and health checkups.
The science and the myths
There is no such thing as a pit bull “lockjaw,” where supposedly pit bulls bite and lock their jaw when attacking, Colorado veterinarians and researchers agree.
Pit bull is not a breed. It’s a catch-all term. There are American Pit Bull Terriers, American Staffordshire Terriers and Staffordshire Bull Terriers that are all included in the Aurora breed-specific ban.
Pit bulls are difficult to distinguish, according to many veterinary professionals.
Aggressive dog behavior is more about the dog’s treatment and training than the breed.
Studies have also found that physical traits of a dog have little effect on their personality.
“Dog breed is generally a poor predictor of individual behavior and should not be used to inform decisions relating to selection of a pet dog,” according to an article published in Science journal in 2022, called ‘Ancestry-inclusive dog genomics challenges popular breed stereotypes’.
Pit bulls were not always the main culprit of lousy press; Bloodhounds, Dobermans, Rottweilers and German Shepherds have all had bans during different periods in the United States.
In the early 20th Century, pit bulls were celebrated as “America’s Dog,” and featured in military recruitment posters. However, perceptions shifted in the 1980s, linking them to gangs and drug culture. Linder states that pit bulls became symbols of criminality, particularly during the War on Drugs. The 2007 Michael Vick dog-fighting case further entrenched these associations, raising concerns that breed-specific laws aim to marginalize Black communities.
“This Article examines the relationship between pit bulls and people of color, incorporating new research to argue that these laws may be rooted in racial bias. In such instances, breed-specific bans function as a means of keeping minorities out of majority-white neighborhoods,” Linder said.
Another study from Denver University, ‘A Quantitative Study of Denver’s Breed-Specific Legislation’ published in 2020 found that the enforcement of the city’s pit bull ban was primarily focused in racially diverse neighborhoods. Additionally, despite the city investing $100 million over 30 years in enforcement, there was no significant effect on public safety.
A DU-published feature summarizes the 2020 study where Kevin Morris, American Humane endowed chair and research associate professor explains that the most “stunning” finding was the unequal enforcement of the pit bull ban in the city’s most vulnerable areas, especially where “racially diverse communities intersect with predominantly white neighborhoods,” as the study notes.
“The enforcement of BSL has taken place primarily in our communities of color in Denver,” Morris says. “And this criminalization of certain pet owners has exacerbated the barriers they already experience to accessing pet support services.”
Alternative Solutions
Research from all of the studies listed indicate that better alternatives to breed-specific bans include stronger enforcement of animal cruelty laws, public education about animal welfare and animal behavior, and stricter leash laws.
“We really find that the most effective thing with dangerous dogs is to treat dogs and owners as individuals, because any dog can bite, any breed of dog can bite, any owner can raise a dog to bite.” Mickleson said.
Our beloved Chessie, a Chesapeake Bay Retriever, was bitten by a pit bull in Utah Park. The owner, exhausted from chasing and looking very worried, was trying to catch his lose dog. (At home we discovered two canine bite holes in Chessie’s rump and took her to our veterinarian. She prescribed an antibiotic.)
Most pit bulls are wonderful! (Petey, in The Little Rascals, was a pit bull.)
Owners, just be responsible and extra careful with your pit bull dogs. Do not teach or allow them to be aggressive.
If they are aggressive, humanely euthanize them before they injure or kill a pet or person.
> If they are aggressive, humanely euthanize them before they injure or kill a pet or person.
They are aggressive by nature, it’s quite literally a trait of the breed. The problem is that their aggression is unpredictable. Most people do not see “signs” before an attack happens. A pitbull can show no agression for years and then attack and kill their owner out of nowhere. We have seen this over and over – how much more proof is needed? These dogs are bred to kill.
Pit Bulls are not good pets. The problem is that they seem nice and friendly until they are not. Wanna be thugs and gangstas think they are super cool having a vicious killing machine but all they are doing is endangering the community. Pit Bulls, bred for fighting and killing, have no place in a civilized society. The ban is in place for a reason. Nobody banned Pits on a whim….it was due to a trend of maimed and dead children.
It’s not the breed, its the owners, and many pit bull owners are poor owners. (Many are also good). We need to ban the bad owners. Just how we do that I do not know.
That trope is worn out. It is the breed. Lions and tigers do not have owners yet they are skilled and eager to kill. The concept that an animal being owned causes it to kill is absurd.
Just no, once and for all. Even with requiring insurance for harm done, once it’s done it’s done! Owners cannot be trusted to properly train or restrain their dogs .
This means there is danger to children and other dogs….so, no.
“Although pit bulls were originally bred and trained to display aggression against other dogs, aggression against human beings was not encouraged, because, even while fighting, the dogs had to be handled by their trainers. Dogs displaying this trait were not selected for breeding. However, the resurgence of dogfighting—illegal in the United States, Great Britain, and many other countries—led irresponsible breeders to encourage such traits in their animals and to mistreat them in order to induce a vicious temperament. Well-publicized attacks on people by dogs identified as pit bulls led to the passage of legislation in some jurisdictions that bans or restricts the keeping of the breeds. “
Interesting this article omitted data on pitbull related deaths and injuries.
Based on data from 2005-2017 pitbull-type breeds were responsible for 66% of fatal attacks, while only constituting 6.5% of the total US dog population.
There were 284 pitbull-related deaths from 2005-2017.
Compared to the second most dangerous breed, Rottweilers, which caused 45 total deaths within the same timeframe Pitbulls account for 6 TIMES the number of fatalities for the same timeframe.
While it’s true that training and ownership have a lot of impact on aggressive behavior, the data clearly indicates one of two things – 1. These dog breeds are by a large margin more aggressive and cause far more fatalities than any other dog breed, period. And, 2. These dog breeds have a history of poor ownership, which contributes to these astounding statistics.
Furthermore, the city council unlawfully overturned the vote to ban these breeds in Aurora.
Either way, the answer is very clear – pitbulls do not belong in Aurora.
In this case, driven by Matt Snider by private lawsuit only wanted the council to follow the law. The Aurora City Council ignored its city charter and override the express will of its voters. Specifically, in 2014 city voters overwhelmingly rejected an ordinance that would have repealed the city’s ban on pit bulls. Under the Aurora City
Charter, the City Council may not adopt an ordinance previously rejected by voters. But in January 2021 the City Council nonetheless expressly adopted a regulation by revised ordinance that Aurora’s voters rejected in 2014. So here we are simply correcting city councils’ lawmakers lacking the proper knowledge to establish law, they underestimate the voters that actually pay attention.