By Gretchen Bernardi Almost five years ago to the day (as I write this), the final report of the High Volume Breeders Committee, its existence then considered a radical, even dangerous idea, was presented to the AKC board of directors by the report’s author and the committee’s chairman, Patti Strand. It is perhaps a good time to evaluate the purpose of that committee, its work and the fruits of that labor, especially since one of its principal recommendations had a five year deadline for implementation. The history leading up to the formation of this committee is well-known but worth repeating. In 2000, the AKC was in the midst of a crisis. The cash cow was drying up, due, in large part, to the boycott of the AKC registry by the commercial breeders in Missouri, spearheaded by Missouri Pet Breeders in March of that year. The back-breaking straw in this scenario was the newly implemented Fre-quently Used Sire program.2 What was the AKC thinking? First, it institutes a policy requiring minimum standards of care and now it wants to ensure the parentage of the dogs in its registry. So this particular camel, wanting to be out from under the yoke of more inspections and more requirements, moved most of its registrations to a little-known registry in Arkansas – American Pet Registry, Inc. Actually, that organization and its breeders were visionaries. They had been told repeatedly that without AKC registration papers their dogs were worth very little and that the American public wanted, actually de-manded, those papers. Until then, only the United Kennel Club and the American Kennel Club controlled the puppy paper market and the AKC certainly held the lion’s share of that market. But soon everyone realized that people who bought their puppies in the pet stores didn’t care who printed the paper that accompanied those dogs and APRI is now one of the four or five major registration entities in the country. From its website: “The nation’s only pet registration service dedicated to the preservation and promotion of pet ownership and the professional pet industry.” It has subsequently merged with Academic Kennel Records and American Breeders Association, among others. Unable to distinguish itself as the premier registry that we know it is, the AKC found its registrations in serious decline. We have all been bombarded with this news, but suffice it to say that in six years – from 1999 through 2006 – AKC registrations dropped by 249,428 dogs and 113,066 litters. Those figures are even more significant for our discussion than a simple formula of number of dogs registered times registration fees, since most of the commercially-bred puppies are sold with at least one supplemental transfer fee. During the initial, dramatic drop in these registrations, an officer of the AKC stood before the delegate body and said that although we had lost a significant chunk of the commercial breeders, we really “don’t need the puppy mill dogs.” But someone clearly thought we did. It was in this atmosphere that the HVBC committee was formed and its mission statement written at its first meeting in September, 2001: “The mission of the High Volume Breeders Committee is to assess the current status of high volume breeding kennels and their role in, and impact on, the AKC registry; to define the appropriate relationship between high volume breeding kennels and the AKC, and to recommend to the AKC Board of Directors actions to implement the committee’s findings.” To fulfill the mission of the committee, Chairman Strand arranged several outings for the committee. A “town hall meeting” was held outside of Kansas City, attended by breeders in the area. Of course, it was not accidental that this meeting was held in the heart of the commercial dog breeding industry, so the majority of attendees were commercial breeders, with a handful of hobby breeders. Due to an all-breed show just one hour north of the meeting and also to the fact that there was some delay in notifying the several all-breed clubs in the area, attendance by hobby breeders was limited primarily to those personally invited by committee members. The next day, most of the committee members toured the Hunte facility, located in Goodman, Missouri. In the report, Chairman Strand correctly describes the facility as a “state of the art facility, widely regarded as the best in its category in the US” and goes on to praise its staff veterinarians, air-exchange system, staff size and expertise, and high-end transportation to pet stores nationwide. But the Hunte Corporation is a high volume broker, not a breeder. The next scheduled field trip was to a pet store headquarters, none other than Petland in Ohio. In hindsight, is this beginning to seem slightly too coincidental? The report has nothing but high praise for the Petland operation: “modern kennel equipment similar to that found in veterinary clinics,” “store personnel trained as animal caregivers and pet counselors,” and more. Indeed, the committee was impressed with the company’s initiatives, but Petland is a high volume retailer, not a breeder. Although the committee was named “high volume breeders committee,” members pointed out that it had visited everything BUT high volume breeders. The committee then toured three chosen and pre-notified commercial kennels in Missouri in order, according to the report, “to assess the effectiveness” of the inspection program currently in place. That mission was, of course, impossible since few of the committee members had ever visited a really high volume kennel either before or after the implementation of the AKC care and condition policy3 and could therefore not assess whether or not there had been improvements. It should be said that those committee members who had previous first-hand observations of commercial kennels noted that those kennels visited did not represent the average commercial kennel. However, and this must be emphasized, everyone involved in the oversight and observation of the commercial breeding industry agrees that great strides have been made in standards of care at these facilities and that those improvements continue today. From the initial announcement that this committee had been formed, it fought to dispel the notion that “high volume breeders” was a semantic construct, a simple euphemism for “puppy miller,” and that the committee had been formed simply to legitimize a practice that most members of the fancy abhorred. At every opportunity, committee members emphasized that “high volume” simply meant “seven or more litters,” regardless of breeding motive, that “high volume” meant “high volume,” nothing more. And yet there were no field trips to show breeders producing seven or more litters, no visits to non-commercial high volume breeders. After the various field trips and presentations by AKC staff, an USDA inspector and representatives of the company that develops and sells DNA collection and storage technology, the committee deliberated and arrived at its recommendations. From the time the report was made public, “as recommended by the high volume breeders committee” has been used often to justify whatever action or inaction was being undertaken or to praise or criticize that activity or policy. The recommendations were simple, but an examination of those recommendations and their implementation tell an interesting story. The committee recommended in-creasing I&I staff and budget to allow inspection of all high volume breeders annually; expanding pet store inspections; creating a rapid response to emergency and high profile situations; establishing closer cooperation and working relationships with regulatory agencies; creating a speakers bureau for appropriate venues; and developing an emergency plan for high volume kennels. As of today, we have not increased the inspection and investigation staff. There have been announcements of newly hired field agents, but an equal number have retired; even though we have expanded the pet store and auction presence and reduced the number of litters that triggers a possible inspection. Although AKC boasts of the number of inspections conducted annually, a few minutes with a calculator will point out the shortcomings of the inspection program when considering the number of working days in a year, travel time, number of inspectors and the time needed for a careful inspection of premises and records. These inadequacies are apparent in the recent forced closings and confiscations at kennels with large numbers of AKC dogs. Some of these were inspected recently and others had not been visited for two years. And close reading of the Gazette will show that AKC is very rarely suspending breeders for inadequate standards of care, having decided to help them improve their kennel conditions instead. Such a plan would be commendable if those kennels were then inspected in 30 days or even 60 days to see if those improvements had been made. But this is generally not the case. I have no knowledge of whether or not the other recommendations in this section have been implemented, although the new breeders symposia could, I suppose, qualify as speakers for appropriate venues. But “rapid response” or “Emergency plans”? Requiring all dogs sold at auctions to be a minimum of 8 weeks of age and microchipped. This rule has been put in place and is, by all accounts, being enforced. When the committee was first formed, it was my personal goal to eliminate all AKC dogs from being sold at auction, but the issue was more complex than I had thought and the committee, in the end, felt that these recommendations were at least an improvement, however slight. Hobby breeders, especially the delegates, were horrified that the committee recommended an eight week minimum age for AKC dogs at the auctions, not realizing that until this rule was implemented, puppies of any age were being sold along with bitches ready to whelp. I have no way of knowing how many AKC dogs are currently going through auctions, but I know that this form of selling breeding stock is expanding country-wide. Until recently, the auctioneers routinely held the pregnant bitches up to show the bidders the obvious signs of pregnancy. But at a Missouri auction this month, the auctioneer announced that the auction handlers would not be “showing the bellies of bred females” for fear of being videotaped by “animal rights wackos” and aired on the evening news. However offensive dog auctions are to most of us, even in this day of lowered sensibilities, and however meager the HVBC’s recommendation were, they were something and they have been implemented. Success number one! Requiring all dogs registered with AKC to be microchipped. Even though the paranoid fanatics and conspiracy theorists see mandatory microchipping, along with the animal identification system recommended by the Department of Agriculture, as part of a vast animal rights conspiracy implemented with the help of black helicopters, microchips remain the most reliable means of on-dog identification and reliable on-dog identification is required by AKC rules. We are still in the business of guaranteeing as much as possible that the puppies we register are sired by the dog and out of the bitch listed on the registration papers. When our inspectors go into a kennel, they want to see the paperwork matched to the dog. Microchipping makes that identification and inspection easier and virtually foolproof. Exploring an endorsement registration system and a rollback of supplemental transfer fees to replace existing supplemental transfers; creating registration incentives; offering voluntary microchipping documentation on registrations. AKC rules require a paper trail to verify all ownership through which an individual dog passes. Historically, this has been verified by supplemental transfer papers accompanied by an additional fee, but recently those transfer papers have been replaced by powers of attorney actually supplied by the AKC. In my opinion, it is arguable that these powers of attorney actually fulfill AKC requirements, but they were still accompanied by transfer fees, which had recently been raised. The committee recommended a rollback of these fees and it went into effect immediately, causing, I am told, a substantial loss of revenue to the AKC. That muddies the issue of whether or not the transfer papers versus the power of attorney papers were being used more frequently, but this rollback was the one recommendation that went into effect immediately. An endorsement registration system is simply one that has several lines on the registration form to keep track of the trail of ownership rather than multiple registration papers and supplemental transfer papers and power of attorney documents. It seems like a good idea. What happened to the recommendation? Setting a 5-year goal of having DNA on file for every sire and dam in the AKC registry. The desirability of DNA profiling for all sires and dams in the AKC registry is such a logical concept as to hardly need discussing. However, why a registry that is and wishes to continue to be the premier registry in the United States refuses to utilize the most modern technology, the one used by most livestock registries, is not a mystery: if the Frequently Used Sire program caused the commercial breeders to abandon us, imagine their reaction to DNA on all sires, plus all dams, even if the cost of so doing was reduced drastically through new technology. Throughout the committee’s deliberation, the recurring theme was enhancing the AKC’s image, and hence increasing the public’s demand that its puppies be AKC registered. This theme invoked the concept of “raising the bar,” a phrase introduced to these proceedings by committee member Steven Gladstone and explained in detail in a white paper presented to the committee. DNA profiling on sires and dams was an essential part of that enhancement and yet such a plan seems to be completely off the table and, as far as the minutes tell us, has not yet been discussed at the board level. And yet, this week brings an official announcement that has been expected for over a year: the AKC has entered into a contractual arrangement with China’s Noted General Kennel Club and two of the four stated requirements for registration are mandatory microchipping and a mandatory DNA profile, two of the HVBC chief recommendations which have been ignored. Why is it a good idea for a Chinese registry, but not for ours? Establishing a breeders department for education, 800-number phone access, veterinary outreach; and developing criteria for recognizing quality breeders. To one degree or another, all of these suggestions have been implemented, if one includes the breeder of the year award presented at the Invitational, although those criteria remain unclear. Developing a formal program with financial, consulting and leadership support for purebred rescue. Nothing here. Establishing a dialog with high volume breeders. No one can deny that this suggestion has been carried out with enthusiasm and a plethora of new ideas. AKC became a platinum member of the Missouri Pet Breeders, the very organization which launched the boycott. AKC removed the “do not buy puppies from a pet shop” from its website. Andrew Hunte, founder of the Hunte Corporation, was invited to sit in the VIP section at the Invitational and in the AKC box at Westminster. AKC entered into and then backed out of an undisclosed contractual arrangement with Petland. AKC offered quickly expiring discount registration coupons clearly aimed at the most frequent breeders. In August, the board unanimously passed a resolution, with directors Patty Haines and Bill Newman abstaining, “to direct management to aggressively pursue the registration of every AKC registerable dog and to actively welcome any breeder or owner who is willing to abide by all AKC rules, regulations, and policies”.4 Some wondered why such a resolution was necessary. Haven’t we always welcomed those breeders? Or is this simply a blanket approval for whatever new initiatives are devised to win back lost registrations by any means and will these initiatives possibly address the largest bulk of our registry, the occasional, one-litter breeder – the ones we continue to ignore? The HVBC fully understood that the commercial breeders had always used the AKC registry and the committee members never once even considered the removal of that sector from AKC services. The second task undertaken by this committee, following the creation and approval of its mission statement, was the writing and approval of a Committee Consensus: “The committee members understand that the commercial pet industry will continue with or without the AKC, and unanimously agree that the protection and preservation of purebred dogs and the sport itself are best served by working with all purebred breeders who are willing to comply with AKC rules, regulations and policies.” It is my opinion that a very few members of that committee knew at that time just where this was headed. Commissioning a nationwide survey on dog ownership. Again, nothing. In the end, what am I to think of the good work carried on by this committee and the thoughtful recommendations it made to the AKC board? More importantly, what am I to think of the AKC board and staff that, five years later, have addressed those recommendations that abide by its current philosophy of pursuing commercially-bred registrations in the absence of “raising the bar” and has ignored those that eight of the nine committee members thought would do just that and thereby enhance the name AKC. At the creation of the committee, its critics said that it was formed to sanitize the commercial breeding industry and that “high volume breeder” was simply a euphimism for puppy mills. I disagreed with that assessment when the committee began its deliberations five years ago, but to my everlasting shame, I think they were wiser than I.
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