Front page of the Columbus Dispatch. Federal regulators require disaster plan for magician’s rabbit OZARK, Mo. — This summer, Marty the Magician got a letter from the U.S. government. It began with six ominous words: “Dear Members of Our Regulated Community...” Washington had questions about his rabbit. Again. Marty Hahne, 54, does magic shows for kids in southern Missouri. For his big finale, he pulls a rabbit out of a hat. Or out of a tiny library, if he’s doing his routine about reading being magical. To do that, Hahne has an official U.S. government license. Not for the magic. For the rabbit. The Agriculture Department requires it, citing a decades-old law that was intended to regulate zoos and circuses. Today, the USDA also uses it to regulate much smaller “animal exhibitors,” even the humble one-bunny magician. That was what the letter was about. The government had a new rule. To keep his rabbit license, Hahne needed to write a rabbit disaster plan. “Fire. Flood. Tornado. Air conditioning going out. Ice storm. Power failures,” Hahne said, listing a few of the calamities for which he needed a plan to save the rabbit. Or maybe not. Late Tuesday, after a Washington Post story on Hahne was posted online, the Agriculture Department announced that the disaster-plan rule would be re-examined. For Hahne, this whole saga has provided a lesson in one of Washington’s bad old habits — the tendency to pile new rules on top of old ones, with officials using good intentions and vague laws to expand the reach of the federal bureaucracy. “Our country’s broke,” Hahne said. “And yet they have money and time to harass somebody about a rabbit.” Hahne is a slight man with the stage persona of an exuberant doofus. He’s been doing magic shows full time for 27 years, on cruise ships and on land. That means he’s experienced most of the troubles a magician can expect: Overexcited kids who wet themselves after he brought them onstage. A rabbit so mean it growled. But he did not expect the U.S. Department of Agriculture. “She said, ‘Show me your license.’ And I said, ‘License for...’” Hahne recounted. This was after a 2005 show at a library in Monett, Mo. Among the crowd of parents and kids, there was a woman with a badge. A USDA inspector. “She said, ‘For your rabbit.’” Hahne was busted. He had to get a license, or lose the rabbit. He got the license.The long road to regulated rabbits began in 1965, when Capitol Hill was captivated by the story of Pepper, a dognapped Dalmatian. The dog had been stolen from its family, used in medical research and killed. After an outcry, Congress passed a law that required licenses for laboratories that use dogs and cats in research. In 1970, Congress passed an amendment that extended the law’s reach. It now covered a variety of other animals. And it covered animal “exhibitors.” Hahne has an official USDA license, No. 43-C-0269, for Casey — a 3-pound Netherland Dwarf rabbit with a look of near-fatal boredom. The rules require him to pay $40 a year, take Casey to the vet and submit to surprise inspections of his home. The USDA has 14 pages of regulations just for rabbits. But not all rabbits. Animals raised for meat are exempt from these rules. “You’re telling me I can kill the rabbit right in front of you,” Hahne says he asked an inspector, “but I can’t take it across the street to the birthday party” without a license? Now, he needs both a license and a disaster plan. This new rule was first proposed in 2006. Its inspiration was Hurricane Katrina, in which animals from pet dogs to cattle were abandoned in the chaos. Hahne has obtained professional help. Kim Morgan, who has written disaster plans for entire federal agencies, volunteered to help write the rabbit’s plan for free. So far, the plan she has written is 28 pages.
Posted on: Wed, 24 Jul 2013 02:43:46 +0000
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