Bill Smith's Continued Campaign

Bill Smith, who heads an organization based in my neck of the woods called Main Line Rescue, made headlines when he got Oprah to dedicate two episodes of her show to showing behind the scenes footage of his volunteers rescuing dogs from puppy mills. In fact, Smith has dedicated most of his life to fighting puppy mills which seem to be especially prevalent in Lancaster County, Pa.

The July 20 issue of Newsweek has a follow up to this fight and the article about it that Suzanne Smalley had written in April (Newsweek, 4.13/2009. Vol. 153, issue 15, p. 52-55), in the form of a short article by the same author. In it, she writes that Smith had noticed that many of the farms near Main Line Rescue, which is close to Lancaster County, had signs announcing that they were organic dairies. A little digging later, and Smith discovered that one known puppy mill operation that had already been cited for keeping dogs in filthy cages was supplying milk to Horizon Organics. If you shop at Whole Foods, you will find Horizon products in their dairy section.

Before Smalley printed her April piece, she contacted both Horizon Organics and Whole Foods to notify them that Newsweek was publishing an article that would reveal they were purchasing milk from an "organic" farmer who had received citations for mistreating dogs. Horizon subsequently suspended the farmer from their list of suppliers. This farmer, who no longer peddles or raises dogs, has recently been reinstated as a Horizon supplier.

But there's more. Smith demanded that Whole Foods notify all of their chains that they should not do business with farmers who have dog breeding/selling operations on the side. They did. According to Smalley, this was a huge request on the part of Whole Foods and shows, as Smith puts it, that "consumers have always had the power to close these facilities."

Now Smith is making the same demands of all other businesses who do business with farmers that operate dog breeding/raising operations on the side. "If other companies follow Whole Foods' lead, farmers everywhere who are operating puppy mills as side businesses will either clean up their acts or stop breeding dogs altogether," he notes.

As they say, one small step for responsible business practices; one giant step for animal welfare.