How One County Is Putting An End to Unreliable Breed-Specific Legislation — Dogster

Should you’ve ever had a canine labeled a “Pit Bull” by a shelter, a landlord, an insurance coverage adjuster, or a stranger on the park, there’s an actual probability that label was mistaken. Not simply mistaken within the sense of opinion, however mistaken in a statistically vital approach.

This is not simply an summary debate. On November 18, 2025, the Prince George’s County Council in Maryland voted to go CB-97, ending one of many longest-standing breed bans within the nation. The brand new guidelines took impact on February 2, 2026. Whereas that is triumphant information for native lovers of the American Pit Bull Terrier, it additionally highlights how unreliable the premise of a “Pit Bull ban” tends to be, wherever it is written into regulation.

Don’t Choose a Guide, or a Pit Bull, By Its Cowl

Breed-specific legislation rests on a easy assumption: that an individual can reliably have a look at a canine and determine their breed. In a widely cited 2015 study printed in The Veterinary Journal, that assumption was known as into query.

Researchers had 16 shelter employees members, together with veterinarians, visually assess 120 canines throughout 4 shelters, then in contrast these assessments to DNA testing. The outcomes weren’t even shut. DNA recognized solely 21 % of the canines as having Pit Bull-type heritage. Primarily based on look alone, employees flagged 52 % of these canines as Pit Bull-types, whereas one in 5 canines genetically recognized as Pit Bulls have been missed by each single employees member. One third of canines labelled as Pit Bull-types by employees didn’t possess Pit Bull DNA, and there was solely reasonable consensus amongst employees members, together with educated professionals working the identical shelters.

The researchers’ conclusion was blunt: dependable identification of “Pit Bull” canines based mostly on look will not be attainable, even for specialists, a discovering according to the CDC’s resolution to take away canine breed from its chunk statistics, on the grounds that breed will not be a helpful predictor of chunk danger within the first place.

Consider it like eyewitness identification in a courtroom. It feels dependable within the second, however the knowledge says in any other case.

$3 Million a 12 months to Implement an Unreliable Legislation

The method of ending the ban in Prince George’s County has additionally revealed how a lot imposing this unreliable regulation can price. In line with county officers, the ban focused Staffordshire Bull Terriers, American Staffordshire Terriers, American Pit Bull Terriers, and any canine that merely seemed to be predominantly one in all these breeds, and value an estimated $3 million a yr to implement. In the meantime, an estimated 20,000 to 30,000 Pit Bull-type canines have been already residing within the county your complete time.

On the public listening to, Caitrin Conroy of the Pet Unity Project advised the council, “Our present regulation doesn’t improve security. It really does the alternative.” Given what the shelter-identification analysis reveals, an unknown share of these “banned” canines have been probably by no means Pit Bull-type in any respect, and an unknown share of canines who have been by no means flagged could have been.

Why This Is not Only a Maryland Downside

Breed-specific guidelines present up far past animal management ordinances. Residence and pet insurance coverage insurance policies regularly exclude or upcharge for “Pit Bull-type” canines. Rental listings and HOA bylaws do the identical. Rescue and shelter web sites label canines by breed to assist with adoption, usually based mostly on the identical sort of visible guess the 2015 research examined. None of those methods sometimes use DNA to substantiate the label earlier than it is utilized, and all of them carry actual penalties: a denied lease, a canceled coverage, a canine handed over for adoption, or a canine whose proprietor is unknowingly or unintentionally breaking the regulation.

Analysis overwhelmingly reveals that with out DNA screening, it’s just about unimaginable to precisely determine a canine as a Pit Bull, so how can any state or county impose legal guidelines that hinge on unreliable identification strategies, each in imposing such a ban and labelling the breed as harmful within the first place? There have to be a greater approach.

Conduct In, Breed Out: The New Guidelines

Below CB-97, Prince George’s County changed its breed-based ban with behavior-based evaluation. All canines should now be leashed, with retractable leashes now not thought of ample restraint. Penalties for any canine legally deemed harmful, no matter breed, now vary from $500 to $3,000 relying on the offense. Residents fostering or adopting a beforehand banned breed undergo a brand new pilot program requiring a $25 allow and necessary coaching. HOAs and personal landlords can nonetheless set their very own breed or dimension restrictions, so a repealed county regulation does not override a lease.

What This Means If Your Canine Would possibly Be a “Pit Bull”

Should you stay someplace with breed restrictions, whether or not in a lease, an insurance coverage coverage, or a neighborhood ordinance, and there is any ambiguity about your canine’s ancestry, a DNA check is cheap relative to what’s at stake and removes the guesswork totally. Documentation of your canine’s particular person habits and coaching historical past tends to hold extra authorized and sensible weight than a visible label ever will, and it is value maintaining data of each. And if a shelter, landlord, or insurer tells you what your canine “is” based mostly solely on visible evaluation, you’re properly inside your rights to problem it.

By way of my profession, I’ve seen each side of this argument up shut. I’ve comforted pet mother and father whose canine, giant or small, was harm by an animal they have been sure was a Pit Bull, and that worry and grief are actual, not one thing to elucidate away. I’ve additionally listened to Pit Bull homeowners describe the denied leases, the neighbors who cross the road, and the assumptions made a few canine who has by no means shown a hint of aggression of their life. Each of these experiences are true, and neither cancels the opposite out.

We all know that genetics play a big function in temperament and habits, however it has by no means been the entire story. What really shapes how a canine behaves, way more reliably than the width of their jaw or the form of their head, is their socialization, their coaching, and the life they’ve lived with the folks accountable for them. That’s the place actual prevention occurs, and the place the actual duty sits. Watching coverage begin to meet up with that’s one thing I am glad to see, even figuring out this dialog is way from over, and doubtless should not be…

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