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The ADA (American Disabilities act) was signed into law on July 26th, 1990 by President George W. Bush. Service animals are dogs that are individually trained to do work or perform tasks for people with disabilities. A service animal is NOT a pet so any rules that say no pets allowed are overruled by the ADA. Businesses are not allowed to charge a maintenance fee for customers who bring service dogs into their facility. Taxis are not allowed to turn someone down because they have a service dog. That being said, the facility owners and workers are not in any way responsible for the animals. However, if the animals start to bark or growl at others they may tell the owner of the service animal to put it outside. But you can’t make assumptions about the animals, just because one animal was ill behaved doesn't mean that breed of animals will all be the same.
Title II entities (schools) “shall modify their policies, practices, or procedures to permit the use of a service animal by an individual with a disability”. The only problem that has occurred is people are using the ADA’s laws to get their non- service animals into places insisting that they are “service animals”. The business owners are only allowed to ask the people with the disability two questions:
-Is your dog required because of a disability? -What task or service has this dog been trained to do? |
This creates a problem because so many people make the information up, and they aren't required by law to show proof of a disability or present identification for a service dog, and the dogs are not required to wear special collars or harnesses. Some service dog owners have chosen to mark their dogs with Service Dog placards and harnesses to prevent any confusion.
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