On Wednesday, the Veterinary Medical Board (VMB) discussed considering a potential legislative solution to concerns raised by numerous animal shelters and stakeholders on the Minimum Standards and Protocols for Shelter Medicine regulations. Current law requires that animal shelters have a premises permit, equating these shelter facilities to those of a veterinary facility.
At this week’s hearing, the VMB decided to continue to move forward with their informal rulemaking process on Minimum Standards on Shelter Medicine. A draft of those protocols can be viewed here. Once the formal Rulemaking process begins in the next year, a 45 day public comment period will commence. Moving forward, RCRC will continue to advocate for a change in law to resolve the ambiguity with applying premise permits to animal shelters, an arbitrary barrier to providing basic care to surrendered animals in many rural communities.
RCRC’s letter to the VMB can be accessed here.