SUFFOLK CLOSEUP: County Legislature Looks To Restrict Exotic Animals In Traveling Performances

SUFFOLK CLOSEUP

By Karl Grossman

It’s a bipartisan initiative on the Suffolk County Legislature to deal with an unusual issue for the county’s governing body—“A Local Law to Restrict the Use of Exotic Animals in Traveling Performances,” it’s titled. The measure has been on the legislative table for seven months. One of its co-sponsors, Jason Richberg, said last week that his hope is that it will pass “by the end of the summer.”

Richberg, a West Babylon Democrat and former chief of staff and also clerk of the legislature, says “we’re working on the right language—making sure that all the i’s are dotted and t’s are crossed.”

The Republican co-sponsor of the bill is Trish Bergin of East Islip, a reporter and anchor for News 12 Long Island, elected to the Islip Town Board on which she served for 12 years and then elected to the Suffolk Legislature. She says she is especially concerned about such animals brought to birthday parties. “It is important that children attending birthday parties are kept out of harm’s way,” she said. “These encounters with exotic animals that have large claws and large teeth, and may also carry diseases, pose a hazard to small children.”

The measure begins by declaring that “this legislature hereby finds and determines that for profit traveling performances, shows or zoos that involve exotic, wild and/or non-domesticated animals are detrimental to animal welfare due to the adverse effect of severe confinement, lack of free exercise, physical coercion and the restriction of natural behaviors.”

It adds “this legislature further finds and determines that exotic, wild and/or non-domesticated animals pose an additional risk to public safety because such animals have wild instincts and needs and have demonstrated unpredictability.” 

Further, these “traveling performances increase the possibility of escaping exotic, wild and/or non-domesticated animals which can wreak havoc, seriously harm workers and the public.” And, to justify the Suffolk Legislature approving the measure, it says that “county government has broad powers to enact legislation relating to the health, safety and welfare of citizens.”

At one of the public hearings on the bill, John DiLeonardo, president of Humane Long Island, a wildlife rehabilitator and a Riverhead resident, testified: “My organization has long opposed the abuse of wild and exotic animals and traveling acts” and has been involved in “convincing Suffolk County venues to stop allowing exhibitors to”—as an example—strapping “toothless monkeys to the backs of dogs.”

Moreover, said DiLeonardo, with the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus now moving to shows “without animals, and more than 150 cities and counties across 37 states having restricted or banned the use of wild animals in circuses and traveling shows, it has never been clearer that the public has turned its back on cruel and dangerous animal acts.”

Also testifiying, Joann Cave of Nesconset, representing the Humane Society of the United States, told the Suffolk Legislature that the society is “thoroughly in support of this resolution. There has definitely been a growing public awareness about the miserable lives that are endured by animals that are used in traveling shows. The animals spend most of their time in extreme confinement, and they are deprived of everything natural to them.

Spurring the introduction of the measure has been Sloth Encounters, a business in Hauppauge that has people hold, feed and pet sloths—slow-moving tree-dwelling tropical animals—and, according to an article in Newsday, offers “home visits.” 

On its website, Sloth Encounters declares: “We are an animal loving company. We love all of our furry to scaly friends. From regular household pets to exotic animals.” It goes on: “We are New York’s Premier location for Sloth Education as well as all animals at our location. The only place anywhere on Long Island that literally puts you in direct contact with our sloths.”

It adds: “Many states have laws that specifically prohibit individuals from keeping certain exotic animals—including sloths—as pets in their households. New York is not one of those states. In New York….you’re only prohibited from owning wild animals. Specifically, it’s a crime to own, possess, or harbor ‘a wild animal or reptile capable of inflicting bodily harm upon a human being.’ A sloth is NOT a wild animal.”

Bonnie Klapper of Sag Harbor, a former assistant U.S. attorney and legal counsel and a board member of Humane Long Island, said in an interview last week: “The proposed law seeks to protect both humans and animals from zoonotic diseases and injury such as bites. Currently, these wild animal acts are both under-regulated and under-inspected. They move from place to place making inspection almost impossible. The last thing the world needs now is another pandemic resulting from the interaction between humans and wild animals.”

Karl Grossman is a veteran investigative reporter and columnist, the winner of numerous awards for his work and a member of the L.I. Journalism Hall of Fame. He is a professor of journalism at SUNY/College at Old Westbury and the author of six books.