When a dog bites, maims, or kills a person, savages livestock or other pets, or is used in commission of a crime, people become justifiably outraged, the media heavily promotes the story, and politicians scramble for answers. Those answers are rarely well thought out and as a result have several unfortunate consequences: they impact responsible owners and good dogs; they polarize communities; they are costly; they don't address the problem; and they don't work.

NAIA has long recognized the futility of breed specific laws and restrictions and other band-aid solutions and has studied ways to get beyond BSL to help devise workable solutions to keep people and pets safe from dangerous dogs without impacting responsible dog owners. To this end, NAIA will bring together a group of dog behavior experts and community problem-solvers in "Helping communities solve dangerous dog problems: A conference dedicated to finding answers" on May 15-16 near Greater Cincinnati Airport.

This important conference will:

-Focus on community response to dog bites and attacks -Help shelters draw distinctions between dogs that are respon-sibly-owned, dogs that have uninformed or inconsiderate owners, and dogs with owners who scoff at the law; -Propose guidelines that help shelters and rescue groups work together; -Offer help to public health agencies dealing with dog bites -Bring responsible dog owners, trainers and breeders into the process as experts; -Recommend laws that hold owners accountable for the actions of t heir dogs.

For more information, visit the NAIA website at www.naiaonline.org