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Additional Back-up • 10.0.1. 6/22/2021 d. Current Law Does Not Adequately Protect Circus Animals from Abuse and Mistreatment. More generally, the Ordinance is necessary because current law does not adequately protect wild animals from abuse and mistreatment in circuses. For instance, state law bars a person from beating an animal or denying an animal food or water and offers other protections. But because the actual training of circus animals usually occurs in jurisdictions outside of Florida, it is not possible for state and local law enforcement to protect animals from abusive training techniques before they arrive in State. Further, local law enforcement often lacks the training and expertise necessary to determine whether a wild animal's welfare is compromised in the circus At the federal level, APHIS (Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service) -the section of the USDA charged with enforcing the AWA—is likewise limited in its enforcement efforts. According to a USDA Inspector General report: "40 traveling exhibitors we reviewed, Animal Care inspectors could not perform timely re - inspections to ensure that serious noncompliant items that were identified in previous inspections had been resolved. For example, one exhibitor continued to show its elephants on the road even though an animal care inspector had previously cited the exhibitor for the animals being too thin for travelling exhibition.... Without reinspection, APHIS Animal Care inspectors cannot determine if the serious safety violations cited have been corrected. Notably, at least one federal court has characterized the USDA's review of applications for license renewals as "an automatic, 'rubberstamping' type transaction. " • OPPOSITION • In response to similar legislation designed to protect wild animals, some animal exhibitors have argued, among other things, that circus workers will lose jobs if animals may no longer perform; that the public will lose an opportunity to view entertainment; and that other businesses will decline due to the lack of circuses. Banning wild animals from circuses does not mean the end to all circus entertainment in Florida nor must it lead to the loss of hundreds of jobs. Rather, circuses will have to focus on acts that do not use wild animals. Cirque du Soleil, for instance, is popular despite the fact that it does not use animals in its circus shows. Other circuses, like the Bindlestiff Family Cirkus and the Russian American Kids Circus, likewise do not use animals. The roughly two dozen animal -free circuses in the United States are a testament to the public's desire to see circuses that do not exploit wild and exotic animals. -1/.,A - S