[nfbwatlk] [nagdu] A Rational Article On "Fake" Service Dogs

[Debby Phillips]

This is a long article, but very well-written and has got 
information.  If you know people who own businesses, forward this 
to them.  Or your "friends" who take Fluffykins everywhere.    
Debby

 ---- Original Message ------
From: Buddy Brannan via nagdu <nagdu at nfbnet.org
Subject: [nagdu] A Rational Article On "Fake" Service Dogs
Date sent: Sat, 21 Nov 2015 08:33:03 -0500

Yes, a thousand times yes.

From 
http://growingupguidepup.org/pet-or-service-dog-that-is-the-quest
ion/ Reproduced without permission.

Pet or Service Dog, That is the Question



By Colt Rosensweig

Every week, it seems, a news channel will run a segment on 
so-called “fake service dogs”—otherwise known as, well, 
pets.  These segments tend to turn into a tutorial on how to 
abuse the service dog system in the United States.  And they 
provoke a knee-jerk reaction from many members of the public.

“There should be certification of these dogs!”

“We need tighter regulations on service dogs!”

“Why don’t handlers carry around ID cards that prove their 
dog is a service dog?”

“Real service dogs only come from programs; if we just 
eliminate owner-training, no one will be able to pass their pet 
off as a service dog!”

While these proposed solutions may sound good on their face, they 
are actually quite problematic.  They are also directly opposed 
to the regulations and intentions put forward in the Americans 
with Disabilities Act.

The Law: What defines a service dog



The rights of people with disabilities are specially protected by 
both federal (the Americans with Disabilities Act) and state 
laws.  For the purposes of this article, I will primarily focus 
on federal law, as it relates to service dogs.

The ADA states that “a service animal is defined as a dog that 
has been individually trained to do work or perform tasks for an 
individual with a disability.  The task(s) performed by the dog 
must be directly related to the person’s disability.” This 
law is intentionally designed to provide the broadest possible 
protection for disabled people.  It is important to note that the 
ADA does not require:

	• A service dog to be trained by a program.  Service dogs 
can be trained by anyone, including the disabled handler him 
or herself.
	• A service dog to be a particular size or breed.  Many 
service dog tasks don’t necessitate a large dog—small 
dogs can perform signal alert or seizure response tasks, for 
example, just as well or better than a large dog.  Breed 
specific legislation does not apply to service dogs.  A dog 
of any breed or mix who has the ability and aptitude for the 
work can be a service dog.
	• Specific types of collars to be used on a service dog.  
Service dogs may work in whatever equipment a handler deems 
optimal, be that a flat buckle collar, check chain, prong 
collar, head collar, or any other piece of equipment.
	• A service dog to wear any identifying vest, harness, or 
other markers.  Some dogs wear harnesses as part of their 
job (such as a guide dog), and many wear vests as a courtesy 
to the general public and/or to signal the dog when it is 
work time.  This is entirely up to the handler.
The ADA also specifically notes that emotional support and 
companionship are not considered tasks.  These are happy bonuses 
of having a service dog, but if these are all that the dog 
provides, that means the dog is a pet.  No person, disabled or 
otherwise, has the right under federal law to bring a pet into 
no-pet areas.

The Law: The rights of businesses

In addition to being trained to mitigate their handler’s 
disability, a service dog also must be trained to behave 
professionally in public.  The dog must also be leashed or 
tethered in some way unless that interferes with the dog’s 
ability to do a task.  There is no written code of conduct or 
etiquette for service dogs, largely because each service dog’s 
job can vary so much from another’s.  However, there are 
several behaviors that no service dog should ever engage in while 
working in public.

A business has the legal right (and, many handlers would say, the 
obligation) to have a dog removed from the premises if:

	• The dog is out of control and the handler takes no steps 
to control it.
	• The dog is not housebroken.
	• The dog poses a direct threat to the health and safety 
of others.
It is important to note that all of these are behavioral 
requirements.  These apply to all dogs.  This means that 
regardless of who did the dog’s training, where it came from, 
whether the handler is obviously disabled, what kind of vest it 
is wearing, and so on, a dog who behaves in such a manner can and 
should be removed from the business.

Why is this so important? Because while training certifications, 
special patches, I.D.  cards, and other such items of gear can be 
obtained by almost anyone, behavior cannot be faked.  A pet will 
nearly always give itself away as such by behaving in ways no 
service dog would ever be permitted to do.

Businesses are also allowed to ask the handler two questions, if 
it’s not obvious what the service dog’s job is.  Businesses 
can ask 1) if the dog is a service dog, and 2) what the dog is 
trained to do.  This does not mean the business may pry into the 
details of the handler’s disability.  Many handlers will be 
intentionally vague when asked the second question, especially if 
they have a psychiatric disability, since such disabilities often 
carry an unfortunate amount of social stigma.  Once these 
questions have been answered appropriately, the business must 
allow the handler and dog access unless the dog misbehaves in one 
of the ways described above.

Unwritten Rules: Common service dog etiquette

Thanks to a new, more comprehensive FAQ published by the 
Department of Justice this summer, not all of these unwritten 
rules remain unwritten.  Still, the “rules” I’m about to 
list are not a point of universal agreement among handlers.  And 
there are always exceptions to these rules, especially when a dog 
is engaged in a task.

Generally, a service dog should be focused on his handler and his 
job.  He shouldn’t be sniffing merchandise excessively, or 
soliciting attention from strangers.  He should ignore food as 
well as people trying to attract his attention.



Service dogs should keep “four on the floor,” unless it is 
unsafe for them to do so, or they need to do a task.  For 
example, while it may be safe most of the time for a very small 
service dog to walk at heel like a large dog, in a thick crowd it 
is safer for the handler to carry or sling the dog.  A service 
dog should stay under the table while in a restaurant, but if her 
handler starts to have a panic attack, it is perfectly acceptable 
for her to get up and perform deep pressure therapy while across 
her handler’s lap.  Service dogs should not be sitting on 
restaurant chairs or booths, or riding in shopping carts.

Service dogs should not pull their handlers willy-nilly while on 
leash; even while pulling in harness, the dog should be 
well-controlled.  This doesn’t mean that all service dogs must 
walk in a perfect heel.  But generally, a service dog should move 
easily with the handler without pulling.  Much of the time, a dog 
yanking its owner around is a pet.  However, some service dogs 
have been taught to take charge in situations where their handler 
is unable to do so.  If a handler becomes overwhelmed, the dog 
may have been taught to take her to a safe place or a specific 
person.  This can sometimes look like the dog is pulling.  It’s 
usually not too hard to tell the difference between a focused 
service dog taking her handler somewhere as a task, and a pet dog 
dragging his owner to whatever has captured his attention.

When encountering other dogs in public, service dogs should 
ignore them or be easily redirected away from them.  Service dogs 
should not fixate on other dogs, or lunge, bark, or growl.  
Aggression is never acceptable in a service dog.  It should be 
noted, though, that service dogs in training may have dog 
reactivity issues they are working on.  A responsible handler 
will deal with the situation, either by refocusing the dog or 
moving him further away from whatever is causing the behavior.  
People with pets will often make excuses for or completely ignore 
behavior that is unacceptable in a working dog.

Every dog, including service dogs, will have bad days.  No dog is 
perfectly behaved 100% of the time.  And every handler either has 
had or will have that horrible day when they don’t know their 
service dog’s stomach is upset and they have a potty accident 
in a store.  A good indicator of whether the dog is a working dog 
or a pet whose owner has dressed it up is how the handler 
responds to lapses in behavior.  A service dog handler will 
address lapses in behavior immediately, while a person who has 
vested their pet will usually ignore or try to rationalize bad 
behavior.

Service dog handlers often tend to be their dogs’ harshest 
critics.  The day when you are dying inside because your service 
dog has sniffed seven different things in the grocery store and 
won’t position himself precisely and has made googly eyes at 
five different strangers is invariably the day when every person 
you meet seems to be telling you how perfect your dog is.

Abuse: How it affects service dog teams



When pet owners abuse the system by taking their dressed-up pets 
into public, it directly hurts real service dog teams.  If the 
pet misbehaves, the business owner will be far more likely to 
distrust the next team they encounter.  If the pet owner shows a 
business a scam ID from the internet to gain access, when a 
legitimate team refuses to produce such an ID, they may be 
discriminated against and denied access.  The same goes for pet 
owners showing “papers,” which also come from scam sites 
online.

Having to re-educate business owners can be extremely difficult 
for disabled handlers.  Some people have anxiety disorders that 
make it nearly impossible to deal with such conflict.  Many have 
a very limited amount of energy to expend each day, and having to 
educate a business can make it difficult or impossible to 
complete the rest of what that person hoped to accomplish that 
day.

And if disabled handlers are completely denied access, then we 
have to spend our limited resources and energy filing a complaint 
with the Department of Justice.  This will also be bad for the 
business, as they can be fined for denying access to a service 
dog team.

Abuse: How it affects the pet

Something that pet owners who dress up their dogs clearly don’t 
consider is how their actions negatively affect their pet.  The 
reason it takes so long (18-24 months) to train a service dog is 
that their job is extremely demanding and stressful.  Even 
programs that breed their own service dog prospects have high 
wash-out or career-change rates.  So it should come as no 
surprise that the average pet dog is ill-equipped to deal with 
the stress of being in no-pet public areas.

Service dogs are specially trained to deal with things like 
children racing up to them and invading their space, adults 
randomly reaching for their heads, shopping carts rattling by 
inches from their face, and crowds pressing in on them from every 
direction.  These things can stress pet dogs out beyond their 
thresh hold.

Some pet dogs will shut down in the face of such stress—this is 
very unpleasant for the dog.  But some dogs will be so stressed 
out that they lash out.  This is not only unpleasant for the dog, 
but dangerous to the dog, owner, and members of the public.  A 
dog who bites a child because she’s been pushed beyond what she 
can handle not only hurts any service dog team following them.  
That child will likely be hurt, and possibly be traumatized.  And 
the dog may end up being killed because of that bite.  These are 
serious consequences, and if pet owners actually considered them 
and cared more about their dogs than themselves, they would not 
dress their dogs in vests and drag them into public.

Possible solutions

While many people believe that increased limitations and 
regulations on service dogs and disabled people will solve the 
problem of pets in public, it is important to realize that we 
already have laws in place to stop this.

Business owners need further education, clearly, on what their 
own rights are.  Many business owners are afraid to confront 
people with pets in vests because such people will often go 
straight to the media and complain about discrimination.  Often 
they will also try internet campaigns to ruin the business.

For example, a man last year insisted to employees at a Bonefish 
Grill that he had the right to have his dog sit on the booth 
beside him during his meal.  When the employees told him his dog 
needed to be on the floor—where service dogs belong, when not 
actively engaged in a task—he blew up.  Unfortunately, this man 
had a huge internet following which flooded Bonefish’s Facebook 
page with negative comments and reviews.

That particular story ended well for the business.  Service dog 
teams responded to the man’s followers by posting multitudes of 
photos of their service dogs behaving properly at 
restaurants—lying quietly under the table.  Handlers posted 
messages of support and even made a point of patronizing a 
Bonefish franchise near them.  But the story shows how even when 
a person behaves poorly with their dog, they can still try, and 
sometimes succeed, at smearing the business owner who only stood 
up for his or her rights.

When business owners stand up for their rights, furthermore, it 
protects service dog teams.  The absolute last thing that we as 
handlers want to encounter in a no-pets business is a pet who has 
no business being there.  Countless numbers of service dogs, 
owner-trained and program-trained, have had to be expensively 
rehabbed or even retired because they were attacked by pets 
dressed as service dogs.

Behavior is the only unfakeable and completely reliable way to 
evaluate a dog on a given day.  Adding extra hoops for disabled 
people to jump through, or treating us like second-class citizens 
by forcing us to show proof of our disability anytime we want to 
go out in public, does nothing to prevent unscrupulous people 
from finding ways to bring their pets into public.  
Certifications and ID cards can be faked.  Impeccable behavior 
can’t be purchased for $50 from an internet scam site.  It 
can’t be obtained in a day.  It takes an incredible amount of 
time and dedication.  People who want to “take Fluffykins with 
me everywhere!” are not the kind of people who will put in two 
years of training to make sure Fluffykins can handle it.

In addition to educating businesses on their rights and getting 
those rights enforced, another part of the solution is increasing 
the punishment for both people who dress their pets as service 
dogs and the companies that sell useless, problematic 
certifications and ID cards.  It is against the law already to 
falsely represent oneself as disabled, or one’s pet as a 
service dog.  But in most states it is a misdemeanor, and 
punished so infrequently that these people feel no qualms about 
openly admitting their lawbreaking to news stations, 
publications, or even service dog handlers.

Falsely representing a pet as a service dog should be a felony, 
with meaningful punishments.  And selling scam IDs and 
certifications should be plain illegal.  The new FAQ published 
this summer specifically states that “there are individuals and 
organizations that sell service animal certification or 
registration documents online.  These documents do not convey any 
rights under the ADA and the Department of Justice does not 
recognize them as proof that the dog is a service animal.” 
It’s important for owner trainers to be able to buy their gear 
online—most of us don’t have the talent with sewing and/or 
leather working to be able to create our gear on our own—but 
there is no reason anyone needs papers or ID cards.

There are ways to combat people who bring pets inappropriately 
into public without punishing disabled handlers in the process.  
Adding further regulations, extra hoops and obstacles, just makes 
it harder for disabled handlers to get and train the dogs they so 
desperately need.  Unethical people would still find ways to fake 
the ID cards or certification papers, if they were implemented, 
while ethical disabled people would simply be without service 
dogs—especially if they wish to owner-train.

Behavior in public is what matters.  Any dog who behaves 
inappropriately in public, without being brought under control by 
the handler, needs to be removed.  This is already part of the 
law.  We just have to enforce it!


--
Buddy Brannan, KB5ELV - Erie, PA
Phone: 814-860-3194
Mobile: 814-431-0962
Email: buddy at brannan.name




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