IMPORTANT: "Plan B" STOP VA Reptile BAN!

[USARK.Jonathan.Brady]

IMPORTANT: "Plan B" STOP VA Reptile BAN!

Unfortunately the Virginia General Assembly email firewall is filtering out USARK's letter writing campaign to Stop VA Reptile BAN. Most of you have seen numerous emails kicked back as spam. In order to get around the firewall it will require everyone to do just a little more work. Please Do This... It is Extremely Important to demonstrate how many people oppose this ban. Below is two letters. One to the sponsor and committee members of SB477, and one to the sponsor and committee members of HB1242. With each letter is a list of email addresses to send the letter to. It will take a little effort to copy and paste the letter and email addresses to your own email account and send the letters, but please do it! There will very likely be a hearing on SB477 next Thursday!

1) Letter for SB477: (Copy and paste letter and addresses to send an email from your own account)

district24@senate.virginia.gov, district10@senate.virginia.gov, district38@senate.virginia.gov, district15@senate.virginia.gov, district14@senate.virginia.gov, district26@senate.virginia.gov, district09@senate.virginia.gov, district34@senate.virginia.gov, district06@senate.virginia.gov, district28@senate.virginia.gov, district37@senate.virginia.gov, district20@senate.virginia.gov, district13@senate.virginia.gov, district01@senate.virginia.gov, district30@senate.virginia.gov, district18@senate.virginia.gov

Senator Lucas and Committee Members,
As a resident/stakeholder in the Virginia reptile community I appreciate your concern for public safety. However, your proposed bill is far too over reaching in regards to reptiles. Who ever assisted in the construction of the bill obviously doesn't understand the natural history or economics of reptiles in VA; nor their relatively simple captive husbandry requirements. Further, there seems to be no understanding of the difference between occupational hazard and public safety risk.
The reptile industry represents $25 million annually in commerce in Virginia. Thousands make their living in this State because of this business. To cavalierly destroy this non-traditional agricultural interest because of a fundamental lack of understanding is unacceptable. As written, this bill will hurt me and my family. It is bad idea to kill jobs in this kind of economy.
Working with certain reptiles entails a moderate occupational risk, but historically and statistically, reptiles represent virtually zero public safety risk. Dogs account for 35 deaths a year in this country. Captive reptiles less than one per year. Traditional livestock and pets have proven much more of a public safety risk than reptiles. According to US Fish & Wildlife and US Geological Services studies, the rare event of a death as the result of a captive reptile falls into the category of occupational hazard. There is no record whatsoever of a captive reptile creating any measurable risk to the public... NEVER!
Please remove ALL reptiles from SB 477. Thank you.

Sincerely,


2) Letter for HB1242: (Copy and paste letter and addresses to send an email from your own account)

DelCPeace@house.virginia.gov, DelRTyler@house.virginia.gov, DelDMarshall@house.virginia.gov, DelBOrrock@house.virginia.gov, DelCPoindexter@house.virginia.gov, DelBKnight@house.virginia.gov, DelJMorefield@house.virginia.gov, DelMJames@house.virginia.gov, DelMSickles@house.virginia.gov

Delegate Peace and Committee Members,
As a resident/stakeholder in the Virginia reptile community I appreciate your concern for public safety. However, your proposed bill is far too over reaching in regards to reptiles. Who ever assisted in the construction of the bill obviously doesn't understand the natural history or economics of reptiles in VA; nor their relatively simple captive husbandry requirements. Further, there seems to be no understanding of the difference between occupational hazard and public safety risk.
The reptile industry represents $25 million annually in commerce in Virginia. Thousands make their living in this State because of this business. To cavalierly destroy this non-traditional agricultural interest because of a fundamental lack of understanding is unacceptable. As written, this bill will hurt me and my family. It is bad idea to kill jobs in this kind of economy.
Working with certain reptiles entails a moderate occupational risk, but historically and statistically, reptiles represent virtually zero public safety risk. Dogs account for 35 deaths a year in this country. Captive reptiles less than one per year. Traditional livestock and pets have proven much more of a public safety risk than reptiles. According to US Fish & Wildlife and US Geological Services studies, the rare event of a death as the result of a captive reptile falls into the category of occupational hazard. There is no record whatsoever of a captive reptile creating any measurable risk to the public... NEVER!
Please remove ALL reptiles from HB1242. Thank you.

Sincerely,


Please Do This Today!

[jben]

Done..

[babyknees]

Please also print them out and (snail) mail them to the senators and delegates. That will have a greater impact.

[snake lab]

I have printed this out and will be making flyers with the info do hand out at the nova expo. Hope it does something

[RestlessRobie]

Sent and Snail mailed

[KingObeat]

Sent all of mine.

[Skiploder]

Hmmm.

I sent e-mails out Sunday and they bounced. They were from four e-mails addresses at the house.

So how did we come to the conclusion that this was aimed specifically at USARK?

[HighVoltageRoyals]

Really? They're kicking it back as spam? Why don't they bury their heads a little more in the sand for pete's sake.

[ball-nut]

Might be worth noting don't copy and paste the html version of the letter, (eg the one with < b r /> etc.)
Most govt dept spam filters see emails with html code as a threat and will block them as default.

Ok just noticed, it only shows its html code on tapatalk.
On the top letter, do not copy and paste the letter directly into an email, doing so will show the mail as intended but will still contain the html code and then be blocked.
Copy and paste into a basic notepad and if needed edit it to remove ANY html coding. Once it is plain text, copy and paste into your email and the message won't be blocked.

Sent from my phone, to the Internet, to your screen.

[babyknees]

I've been getting responses from the senators in reference to this email so I think it's at least getting through the spam filters there. I think that the House might have tighter spam filters because I've received NOTHING in response from any of them.