San Francisco may ban live-animal sales, sparking pet store backlash

A new push to ban live-animal sales in San Francisco would reshape a corner of neighborhood commerce that already feels squeezed by high rents and tight margins. The proposal drew support from the city’s animal commission and opposition from pet store owners, setting up a fight over whether retail shops should sell living creatures at all.

At a May 14 meeting at City Hall, the San Francisco Commission of Animal Control and Welfare voted on a recommendation to ban retail animal sales in the city, with Kitty Jones of Compassionate Bay and Liz Cabrera Holtz of World Animal Protection US taking part in the discussion. The commission is advisory only; final decisions rest with the Board of Supervisors, the mayor and the city administrator.

A draft commission letter dated May 14 recommended a citywide ban on retail sales of animals in pet stores. It said only 9 of San Francisco’s 38 pet stores currently sell live animals, meaning most neighborhood shops would not be directly affected by the change.

The draft letter argued that the trade in pets is tied to cruelty in both domestic and exotic animal supply chains. It cited U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service data showing about 30% of animals imported for pets each year are taken directly from their wild habitats, and it pointed to one investigation finding that 66% of African grey parrots poached from the wild died in transit.

If the city adopts the ban, residents looking to bring home a pet would likely have to turn to shelters, rescue groups or stores that sell supplies and services instead of animals. The draft letter said pet stores can still survive by focusing on grooming, supplies and rescue partnerships, a model San Francisco already encouraged when it passed a 2017 ordinance banning pet stores from selling commercially bred dogs and cats.

That 2017 law, approved unanimously by the Board of Supervisors on February 14, 2017, also banned the sale of puppies and kittens under eight weeks old and pushed stores to work with shelters and rescue groups to display adoptable animals. The new proposal would go further, extending the city’s policy past dogs and cats to all retail live-animal sales, including exotic pets.

San Francisco would not be acting alone. The draft letter said other cities, including Cambridge, Massachusetts; Washington, D.C.; Arlington, Massachusetts; West Hollywood, California; Easton, Pennsylvania; and Radnor Township, Pennsylvania, have already passed retail animal sale bans. For San Francisco, the question is whether another step toward animal welfare is also a direct hit to storefront businesses that depend on live-animal sales to stay open.