Service Animals, Emotional Support Animals, and Guide Dogs7464192

Sadly, many people are asking whether "service animal" laws are increasingly being abused by those who want to scam the machine.

There have been news stories, articles, opinion pieces along with other editorials where people rant and complain about people they think to be abusing the machine. You hear some complain that they had to sit near a dog at a restaurant which they don't believe is a "real" service dog, or others complain that their neighbors have a pet in the "no pet" building because they claimed your pet is emotional support animal letter.

A number of the commentary has an indignant tone, plus some people are downright angry.

How does this affect those who legitimately own and use a service animal to raised their lives? In lots of ways.

For one, it could it more difficult to navigate bureaucracy on the planet when your claim of the disability as well as your service or emotional support animal's status is questioned. If your landlord or business proprietor has heard negative stories claiming that some people are abusing the system, it can cause these to look suspiciously in any way claimants.

Some landlord and companies have begun seeking proof of status, although asking for written or any other evidence is not always legal, and although many owners of legitimate service animals and emotional support animals have not taken advantage of registering them, and therefore have no such documentation to make.

It is the suspicious attitude and illegal demands of some landlords and business people that make registrations services just like the Service Animal Registry of California so important legitimate owners.

Although registration is optional, it will also help shortcut the housing rental and business access issues once the owner can create a simple document that will often match the owner or landlord. Also, when utilizing public spaces, it is often easier to hand over a document having a simple sentence stating, "This is really a service animal" and letting one other party see the information, rather than having a long-winded protracted conversation (or worse yet, argument) in public places, with onlookers listening in and gathering across the discussion.

So, perform some people scam the system, or game what the law states? Sadly, the answer then is "probably yes." In everyday life, there is always room for abuse the ones can attempt to take advantage of many systems that we as a society applied to protect the rights of people who need such protection. For instance, many drivers falsely display disabled parking placards to benefit from free and convenient parking. Not to mention the number of people that lie on their own tax returns, claim improper tax deductions, abuse store return policies, or do other bad acts.

But that percentage of abuse, which around service animal laws is hopefully small, could well be a very small investment when compared to the higher goal of promoting access and equality for those.

In the end, you cannot control any system to really make it 100% abuse proof. So tolerating the few people who scam service animal laws will be the price we gladly pay to ensure that the disabled in the great state of California have equal access under law.