Sen. Richard Burr, R-N.C., wants to crack down on what kind of service animals are permitted to fly with passengers uncaged in airplane cabins, following recent episodes in which passengers have tried to bring animals for emotional support aboard flights.
“One doesn’t have to look far to find rampant cases of abuse where even emotional support kangaroos have been allowed to fly on planes to the detriment of fellow travelers and handlers of trained service animals,” Burr said in a statement in April.
Burr’s legislation, which he introduced last month, would match the definition of a service animal in the Air Carrier Access Act with the one included in the Americans with Disabilities Act. This would mean that animals that are not specifically trained to assist those with disabilities would be prevented from flying uncaged in aircraft cabins and would not be subject to protections against discrimination outlined in the Americans With Disabilities Act.
Additionally, the legislation would create a criminal penalty for those who make false statements about their service or emotional support animals, and would instruct agencies including the Department of Transportation and the Department of Veterans Affairs to establish a standard of service animal behavior training.
The legislation “will protect the ability of individuals and veterans with disabilities to travel with their trained service animals,” Burr’s statement said.
“This bill will help clearly define what is a ‘service animal’ and will establish penalties for those fraudulently claiming disability needs,” it said.
A variety of groups have backed the measure, including the Association of Professional Flight Attendants, which has safety concerns about having untrained animals in the cabin during emergencies.
“If you read the accounts of evacuations, you realize that even under the best of circumstances, they’re controlled pandemonium,” said Peter Goelz, former managing director of the National Transportation Safety Board and current APFA safety consultant. “Under the worst examples, there are real challenges and if you’ve got untrained animals in the cabin, it really could prevent people from exiting the aircraft in 90 seconds.”
Allie Malis, APFA government affairs representative, said the association had received safety reports that detail situations in which animals in the cabin have bitten a passenger or needed to be restrained.
“If these events happen after takeoff, we are very limited as to what we can do. I’m not an animal trainer,” Malis said.
Goelz also pointed out that the legislation would help surrounding passengers understand that animals in the cabin have undergone training and that there was a “legitimate need” for them to be with a fellow passenger.
“If this legislation were to pass, at least the passenger sitting next to someone or in proximity to someone with an animal would know for sure that the animal was trained and that the passenger had a legitimate need to have the dog or the animal in the cabin,” Goelz said.
Groups that work with service dogs and veterans, including the Association of Service Dog Providers for Military Veterans and K9s for Warriors, also support the legislation.
K9s for Warriors, which has paired hundreds of veterans with trained service dogs since 2011 through their program, believes cutting down the number of “fake” service animals will help veterans who are often heckled while traveling, and whose conditions are not always immediately apparent.
“In particular, we focus on veterans who have post-traumatic stress and traumatic brain injuries. Those are invisible injuries,” said Rory Diamond, CEO of K9s for Warriors. “So when they go to get on planes in particular, they are often harassed because there are so many fake and poorly trained service dogs out there. So anything that reduces the number of fake and poorly trained service dogs will make the lives of our graduates better.”
The Association of Service Dog Providers for Military Veterans and K9s for Warriors, which is a member of the Association of Service Dog Providers for Military Veterans, does have some reservations about establishing a national standard for service dog behavior without their input.
In a letter to Burr, the association said it supports its own “National Standard,” noting that the requirements were “meticulously drafted in coordination with both industry experts and veterans” and “ensure that service dogs and their veteran partners possess advanced dexterity upon the completion of training.”
Diamond pointed out that the requirements demand the dogs undergo hundreds of hours of training and that they are taught to ignore other humans and animals.
As a result, the association is seeking to have input in the adopted standard so the requirements service animals must meet remain high.
“We have a very high standard that we require all our members to meet,” Diamond said. “We want to make sure that whatever the standard that is adopted is a high one.
“The worst thing that can happen is that we have a very very low standard, and that would be bad for everybody involved,” Diamond added.
He said K9s for Warriors will continue to support the legislation “in any way we can.”
“Anything that reduces the number of fake and poorly trained service dogs on planes is good for graduates of programs like ours,” Diamond said.
Malis said that APFA has been contacting House members to try to have similar legislation introduced in the lower chamber. Overall, she said House members have been receptive to the issue and provided positive feedback.
Additionally, Goelz emphasized that groups such as APFA are not trying to restrict the access to trained service animals that meet the requirements of the Americans With Disabilities Act. Rather, they want to ensure that flight attendants can complete tasks without impediment in cases of an emergency.
“We in no way are looking to limit the legitimate access to aircraft cabins for trained service animals as the ADA spells out,” Goelz said. “We fully support everybody’s right to travel and those with special needs need to be accommodated. We’re committed to assisting them, but flight attendants want to make sure in an emergency that they are free to perform their first responder tasks in a complete manner.”
