Reptile & Amphibian Forums

i just attended a town council meeting in which a local woman proposed an ordinance on snakes. her story is that her 12 yr old son went to their neighbor's house and saw his burmese pythons...period! the boy was not bitten, wrapped or so much as musked by any snake. she became paranoid and is now proposing to ban ALL non native snake in our parish.
Here's the thing: niether the council nor the woman has any idea what they are talking about...a line between venomous and non venomous snakes is not even established with these people. i'm in the process of gathering info on the procedures i need to take to squash this proposal. i will post further as it develops.

if anyone else from washington parish is reading this you should be aware because it was obvious this lady was trying to 'sneak' this in...if we had'nt been there, the hammer would have been dropped on this.

if anyone has any tips or advice i would appreciate any help as i'm pretty much going at this alone.

You got mail.

on monday july 23rd the parish council met to further discuss the ordinance. it was stated that the current state regulations were sufficient. i was not asked to speak officially but was asked if that ruling was fair and just. i of course agreed and it was then settled. the woman who brought this whole situation up did not even bother to attend, which was funny considering she initially made such a fuss about it.
the parish council lawyer, steve mogabgab, made a valiant effort at collecting info on this matter and was definately a deciding factor in this situation's abrubt and satisfying end. however, a lot of information and general knowledge is still far from what it should be here. i adressed several council members after the adjournment and have volunteered to be the 'go to guy' if anything like this comes up in the future. my name and contacts will be placed within the council and i will be the first to know about any further problems and i'll serve as the council's official resource for these issues.
i would like to thank Thomas E. and everyone else who was ready and willing to help if this had went in another direction. rarely am i proud of decisions made in this parish but they came through on this one. again, thank you to everyone and hopefully i won't need any assistance on matters like this in the future.

P.S. several council members commented on how much they enjoyed the herp society at the street fair a while back. it was good to hear that those efforts were appreciated.

wow!!! hell i didn`t know about this. I am willing too help any way I can!

Thanks Jesse