My Original Email to the Sierra Club:
Dear California Sierra Club VIPS –
I have been working on ferret legalization for a long time. Back when we started we knew we had opposition from the Sierra Club and other organizations.
That was thirty years ago. More people are familiar with ferrets in California, opposition is about nil and we remain the only state, except Hawaii where ferrets remain illegal.
Our membership is growing and we almost got a legislator to introduce a ferret bill this session. Assemblyman Rocky Chavez and his office were kind enough to do a little digging and told us the opposition is coming from Governor Jerry Brown’s office, who seems vehemently opposed to the idea. With him being out of office shortly, our hopes are still growing. But there’s more.
We pretty much destroyed all the opposition from the California Fish and Game Commission. They were actually laughed at, and not by us, when they said they would not give permits for wild animals – the reason they maintain the ferret ban.
Shortly after that incident their president, Eric Sklar called me to say he didn’t care if people had ferrets or not, that he was uncomfortable with a “don’t ask – don’t tell policy” but if they tried to legalize ferrets they would be sued by “the environmentalists” and it would cost us all a lot of money and they’d still be illegal. He told us to get a legislator because legislation isn’t subject to CEQA and EIR’s.
It is my feeling he knew full well that we’d hit a road block with Jerry Brown’s opposition. Something we didn’t realize at the time.
Now we are here in the 2018 election. There is little doubt that Gavin Newsom will be one of the top two, and come November he will probably be elected.
He has a lot of the same support as Jerry Brown. But he is considerably younger and it was my hope as someone who backed same sex marriage before everyone else – he’d be open to us.
I have tried multiple times to reach out to his office and staff without luck.
Our fear is that with the ferret issue being a minor issue he won’t give it or us, any attention.
I am asking the Sierra Club to clarify your position on legalizing domestic ferrets in California. If the Sierra Club said it was not opposed, or better yet – supports ferret legalization it would remove a huge burden from our effort.
At the very least I hope this is the beginning of a discussion with you. I have thirty years of research on the ferret issue. They do not go feral and they do not harm the environment.
Please help us protect our rights to responsibly own the domestic pet of our choice, a pet that is already in California in large numbers.
Pat Wright
The Response:
From: Kathryn Phillips
Sent: Monday, May 21, 2018 5:28 PM
To: CLIFFNotes@legalizeferrets.org
Subject: Re: Ferrets and the 2018 Election
I am moving Kyle and Eddie to bcc so they can drop out of this email chain and focus on other things.
Sierra Club California has not changed its position as far as I know. I am looking into that, though, and will get back to you when I have a chance.
–KP
And My Response to Her Response
Thank you, Kathryn –
I appreciate the reply.
Although you have a lot on your plate, the perceived opposition to ferret legalization by the Sierra Club has pretty much made our appeal to Democrats such as Jerry Brown futile. Obviously the Democratic establishment is going to listen to the Sierra Club before they listen to us. But the ferret ban is based on bad science or no science.
We were required to fund an EIR before the Fish and Game Commission would proceed with the issue. Here is what we produced through Sacramento State University:
https://www.legalizeferrets.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/Final_Report-1.pdf
We paid $16,000 for this. And then Fish and Game said it would not be accepted without a CEQA checklist. So another $2,500. Then it took 7 years for them to read it. Though before they read it, they told the LA Times it was incomplete. A Public Records Request act proved that no one at either the Department nor the Commission had read the report, yet they still maligned it.
It is pretty well undisputed that ferrets have never attacked wildlife or gone feral anywhere except an island ecosystem (as has happened in New Zealand and the Shetland Islands from ferret-polecat hybrids) . As our report states, ferrets could only do so on an island eco system with an absence of predators and an abundance of prey.
We have noticed over the past five years a wider knowledge of ferrets coming from younger people. Ask the people who work in your office. Mostly likely at least one is familiar with ferrets and will tell you the ferret ban is ridiculous.
Back to the 2018 election. I’m sure Gavin Newsom is juggling many things and ferrets is not something he is thinking about. “If the Sierra Club is opposed to ferrets… “ well, that’s probably as far as he’ll get.
If the Sierra Club can’t base it’s opposition to ferret legalization on facts or science, we are asking you to make the statement that the Sierra Club is no longer opposed to ferret legalization. If you do find some of the bad science, and there is plenty (my “favorite, https://www.legalizeferrets.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/Pet-European-Ferrets_DHS.pdf ) please let us know. Such reports are easily debunked.
We are an organization of thousands. “Crazy Ferret People” seems to be our reputation.
The Sierra Club has hundreds of thousands of supporters. No sane politician would want to offend your organization.
Yet this ban hurts us. We can’t enjoy our ferrets outside as people in 48 other states can. The officials don’t even bother to justify the ban. “Find a legislator” is where we are at. But we can’t if the Sierra Club is still on record as opposing ferret legalization in California.
Thank you again. I try to make this simple but there really is a lot of data and history here.
Pat Wright
LegalizeFerrets.org
(619) 303-0645 or cell (619) 757-7426