Service Animals, Emotional Support Animals, and Guide Dogs5464271

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

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

Some of the commentary comes with an indignant tone, and some people are downright angry.

How can this affect people who legitimately own and make use of a service animal to higher their lives? In lots of ways.

For one, it can it more difficult to navigate bureaucracy around the globe when your claim of your disability and your service or emotional support animal's status is questioned. If a landlord or business owner has heard negative stories claiming that some people are abusing the machine, it can cause these phones look suspiciously whatsoever claimants.

Some landlord and business people have begun seeking proof of status, despite the fact that asking for written or another evidence is not always legal, although many owners of legitimate service animals and emotional support animals never have taken advantage of registering them, and so have no such documentation to create.

It is the suspicious attitude and illegal demands of some landlords and companies that make registrations services like the Service Animal Registry of California so fundamental to legitimate owners.

Although registration is optional, it can benefit shortcut the housing rental and business access issues once the owner can certainly produce a simple document that may often fulfill the owner or landlord. Also, when using public spaces, it is often easier to give over a document using a simple sentence stating, "This is really a service animal" and letting the other party read the information, as opposed to having a long-winded protracted conversation (or even worse, argument) in public areas, with onlookers listening in and gathering across the discussion.

So, do some people scam the device, or game regulations? Sadly, the reply is "probably yes." In life, there is always room for abuse and people can try to take advantage of many systems that people as a society applied to protect the rights of those who need such protection. For example, many drivers falsely display disabled parking placards to take advantage of free and convenient parking. Not to mention the number of people that lie on their tax returns, claim improper tax deductions, abuse store return policies, or do other bad acts.

However that percentage of abuse, which around service animal laws is hopefully small, is arguably a very small investment when compared to the higher objective of promoting access and equality for those.

In the end, you can't control any system to really make it 100% abuse proof. So tolerating the not enough people who scam service animal laws will be the price we gladly pay to make sure that the disabled within the great state of California have equal access under law.