June 24, 2024 • 12 mins
Protecting Kids and Pets Partnership
Former State Representative Diana Urban shares information about a new partnership that will protect the voiceless, animals and children.
www.protectingkidsandpets.com
Former State Representative Diana Urban shares information about a new partnership that will protect the voiceless, animals and children.
www.protectingkidsandpets.com
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Hi, our communities, thank youso much for listening again. To hear
any of our shows, you canvisit my community access dot com. And
we have a very special guest today. She's our former state representative, Diana
Urban, who is now the presidentof a new organization called Protecting Kids and
Pets Partnership. Diana, thank youfor being here today. I can't thank
you enough for having me, Asyou well know, this type of thing
(00:22):
is so very important to me,protecting children and protecting animals. Talk a
little bit about this organization and thelink between people and pets and of course
animal abuse and domestic violence, andespecially our very fragile population and the voiceless
population. Are our animals and ourchildren Diana. Of course, as I
(00:44):
think many of your listeners remember,I was the one that did Desmond's Law,
which was the first law in thecountry to put a lawyer in court
to represent the interests of justice forthe animal. So in cases of egregious
abuse, the animal can now havea lawyer. So the idea is,
so why did we do that,Why do we need a lawyer for the
(01:06):
animal? Well, because there's anamazing link between animal cruelty and violence.
So if you look at, forinstance, school shooters, school shooters,
and if you look at the entirehistory of school shooters, forty three percent
started with animal cruelty. There issuch a link between that and the future
(01:27):
violence of that person that it seemedthat it was a necessity, really a
necessity to take it seriously. Wealso know that if there's an animal being
abused in a household, there's eightypercent chance the child's being abused. As
you know, my other area ofexpertise is economics. I'm a data person.
(01:49):
So when this data is screaming atme that we need to look at
animal cruelty as an act of violence, then yes, I'm all about it.
I want children to be safe,animals to be safe, and without
running on too much, I knowof people I have grandkids where my son
every day he sends them to school, he's not sure how safe they are.
(02:12):
And if we can take animal crueltiesseriously, we can put another notch
in keeping them safe absolutely, andthat does lead us to protecting kids in
pets partnership. And many people onthis program will remember Desmond's Law, Desmond's
Army, Desmond the pat himself,because you know, we were a huge
part of helping to get that lawpassed. It was an honor for all
(02:32):
of us here to be able towork with you directly on that, Diana,
So thank you. Thank you somuch for that Number one. Number
two talk about protecting kids in pets, that partnership and the direct mission.
Well, first of all, Ihave to say to you, Desmond's Law
would not have happened without you.And I wish that everyone in the public
seriously knew that. You are amazingin your ability to reach out to people
(02:57):
to get people concerned, and thereally critical part is to get people to
get to their legislators to make thatextra step, and you are so successful
in that. And I can't everthank you enough for the time that was
spent together. Yeah, and we'regonna spend a lot more time together if
I have anything to do with it. In essence, what I'm looking at
(03:23):
right now is everybody I think isfamiliar with red flag laws, and in
other states they're called extreme protection orders. What it is is when somebody does
a violent act, for instance,there's donastic violence, and there's a restraining
order, and that person has agun. The law says, let's take
(03:45):
that gun away from them for aperiod of time so that we can figure
out whether they are going to commitan act of violence, whether they are
so immersed in this anger at whateverthe person, the wife, the child,
that they will continue and actually usethat weapon. So it's a way
of trying to increase the net ofprotection. So what I am doing is
(04:12):
the university, which happened to beJohn Hopkins, which originally suggested these orders
of extreme protection in that they suggestedanimal cruelty should be a part of what
the judge is looking at when he'sdeciding the or she sorry the or she
is deciding whether to have that orderperpetrated. So when I checked out the
(04:36):
twenty one states that have these extremeorders of protection are red flag laws,
none of them have animal cruelty.So that is the quest right now,
is to recognize that we should haveanimal cruelty extreme acts of violence against animals
as an indicator that maybe, andI'm not saying maybe we should take that
(04:59):
if that person has as a gun, that we should be taking the gun
away for a period of time toreevaluate where that person's psyche is, what
they're really angry about. But rememberthey've already acted out, so you're worrying
when they act up right. Iwas just gonna let me interject right here
(05:19):
because I know a lot of peoplelistening right now. I can almost even
feel everything that's being fought right now. What you're saying. Essentially, if
someone already has a criminal record andhas proven to have done acts of violence
on whether it be animals or children, there should be there should be questions,
comments and concerns whether that person doeshave a gun. I'm not certain
(05:43):
how someone would disagree with that,but I know people have their opinions.
We're not a political program, andI just want to make sure that that
is very clear. But that's whatthis particular organization is, protecting kids and
pets, ensuring that if someone doeslisten, whatever you want to do,
that is your right. This isa free country. If you want to
have a gun, I have agun. If you don't, you don't.
But what we're saying here, orwhat you're saying with this particular law
(06:03):
or partnership would mean, it's justthat if you have been shown to have
a criminal past in history, ifyou've been shown to have a violent history
in past, maybe there should bea better checks and balanced system. Am
I breaking that down a bit?Is that boiling down to to make it
simple? Absolutely? One hundred percent. That's exactly what we're saying, and
(06:24):
I believe that any I mean rightnow, I have three grandkids, Like
I never thought I was going toget old, but all of a sudden,
I have three grand kids. I'mlike, Wow, how'd that happen?
I worry every day that when they'regoing to school, they're going to
public school. I know that momsand dads and grandmas and grandpas and cousins,
(06:45):
they're worried because you can't find apattern of which schools these people might
go to, But we can recognizea pattern of animal abuse and violence.
So if we put that animal abuseinto the equation, and somebody stabs a
pitbull twenty seven times and they havea gun, and they go to court,
and we say, well, waita second, we need to take
(07:08):
that gun away for a period oftime, and in some states it's two
weeks, in some states it's amonth, and then they reevaluate whether they're
going to give them the gun back, because you want to see, what
are we dealing with. Is thisperson a possible risk to take that gun
and remember what I said school shootersforty three percent started with it. Well,
(07:29):
it's an animal take that gun,you know, and so animal abuse
usually starts. That's that's usually thebeginning of most violent criminals. I mean,
that's an FBI stat And also weknow the link between animal abuse and
domestic abuse. And what I wouldlike to let people know is that when
Diana was here in Connecticut a staterepresentative, she was the first one in
the country that started the cross postingbill between Animal Control and Department of Children's
(07:50):
and Families, which is now inI don't know how many states, but
where if you were called to ahouse and you were called there as a
police officer because of a violent situation, because of human violence, and there
was a child in the house,and you would let DCF know, and
then DCF would come out, andif they knew that there was a pet
there, then they would let animalcontrol officers know. So it's cross posting.
Is it a perfect system? It'snot, but it's there in place,
(08:11):
and it has saved lives. Sothat's pretty impressive. Well, what
I would say to you, andI thank you so much for mentioning that
we keep data on it and yes, we can show you where we've been
able to intervene and save a child'slife. Now, come on, if
we can do that, why don'twe do it also with the red flag
(08:33):
laws. I want to save lives. I've said this so many times as
I was working so hard to getDesmond's law, get people to recognize that
it's an act of violence. Ithaunts me the children that we might have
saved had we taken animal cruelty.Seriously, it haunts me. So for
people listening to us, you know, this is a new organization, this
(08:54):
is something that's getting started right now. The website is still working anew but
it will be and hopefully at thetime of the year of this program.
What do you hope the website tobe is where people can get more information,
Diana, I hope it will beprotecting kids. But let me look
at it again, and we wantto make sure we send people to the
right place. Dinect All right,it's protecting Kids and Pets dot com all
(09:20):
lower case, protecting Kids in Petsdot com. Sure I know what I'm
doing. Yes, Sure, protectingKids and Pets dot com all lowercase.
And we want people to go thereget information. See what it's all about.
Take a moment, take a deepbreath before you hear certain things out
of this conversation that are taking outof context. Right. We want people
to understand this is completely just toprotect kids and pets. This would be
(09:43):
for violent offenders. This would questiontheir ownership of any arms that could possibly
hurt other people, not just children. But of course we would love to
save our kids. These shootings thatcontinue to happen our heartbreaking. And if
we can make a little difference,boy, wouldn't that be a better world?
Protecting Kids and Pets dot com dotcom the organization is Protecting Kids and
Pets partnership. Diana Urban, ourformer state representative, still working hard and
(10:09):
I know you've written some books.I know you have a sanctuary farm.
I know that you are still workingwith Desmond's Law here in the state of
Connecticut, which provides at no costto a tax paper kids and youth who
are are older people for career chainswho are looking to be lawyers, real
trial courtroom experience, to help andgive a voice to the voiceless, help
build a case to get a justpunishment for those who are doing just hainous
(10:31):
crimes. To voiceless animals who alsogo on to commit these crimes against human
beings, or in some cases it'sboth at the same time. So thank
you so much for all you've doneand all you do here to keep our
kids and our pets safe. Diana. Oh well, let me tell you
this, in case people are interested, I've decided that I will make myself
(10:54):
available to PPAs, to Chambers ofCommerce to lead the women voters to come
and speak. And the only thingI'm going to charge you are my expenses,
so maybe gas and you have tobuy me lunch or something and speak
on this and then let people askquestions and clarify everything that we're trying to
do. So it would be wonderfulif you know, people listening to this
(11:18):
say, you know what, I'dlike her to come to our PTA.
And I'm focused on New England rightnow, so any place in New England,
but particularly Connecticut. That's where youknow this. I got my start
with this, and that's where you, my dear were there to help,
and Desmond's army was there, andyou know, people came together. Jessica
Rubin at Yukon, they came togetherand we got it done so well.
(11:43):
There's a special place in my heart. Absolutely, Diana. What's what's an
email? If somebody's listening right nowand they want to contact you to have
you out there, what's the bestplace in How's how should they contact you
right right now? The email thatwe're using is d as in Diana s
as in Sam jay as in Jack, thank you as an under twenty two
the number twenty two at gmail dotcom. So say that we say that
(12:05):
email again said go ahead, bas in Diana s as in Sam jay
as in Jack, you as anunder twenty two at gmail dot com.
All right, thank you so much. Former state Representative Diana Urban chatting with
us today about this new partnership protectingKids and Pets partnership website lowercase protecting Kidsanpets
(12:30):
dot com. It's always a pleasureto have you here on Iheartcommunities
Hi, our communities, thank youso much for listening again. To hear
any of our shows, you canvisit my community access dot com. And
we have a very special guest today. She's our former state representative, Diana
Urban, who is now the presidentof a new organization called Protecting Kids and
Pets Partnership. Diana, thank youfor being here today. I can't thank
you enough for having me, Asyou well know, this type of thing
(00:22):
is so very important to me,protecting children and protecting animals. Talk a
little bit about this organization and thelink between people and pets and of course
animal abuse and domestic violence, andespecially our very fragile population and the voiceless
population. Are our animals and ourchildren Diana. Of course, as I
(00:44):
think many of your listeners remember,I was the one that did Desmond's Law,
which was the first law in thecountry to put a lawyer in court
to represent the interests of justice forthe animal. So in cases of egregious
abuse, the animal can now havea lawyer. So the idea is,
so why did we do that,Why do we need a lawyer for the
(01:06):
animal? Well, because there's anamazing link between animal cruelty and violence.
So if you look at, forinstance, school shooters, school shooters,
and if you look at the entirehistory of school shooters, forty three percent
started with animal cruelty. There issuch a link between that and the future
(01:27):
violence of that person that it seemedthat it was a necessity, really a
necessity to take it seriously. Wealso know that if there's an animal being
abused in a household, there's eightypercent chance the child's being abused. As
you know, my other area ofexpertise is economics. I'm a data person.
(01:49):
So when this data is screaming atme that we need to look at
animal cruelty as an act of violence, then yes, I'm all about it.
I want children to be safe,animals to be safe, and without
running on too much, I knowof people I have grandkids where my son
every day he sends them to school, he's not sure how safe they are.
(02:12):
And if we can take animal crueltiesseriously, we can put another notch
in keeping them safe absolutely, andthat does lead us to protecting kids in
pets partnership. And many people onthis program will remember Desmond's Law, Desmond's
Army, Desmond the pat himself,because you know, we were a huge
part of helping to get that lawpassed. It was an honor for all
(02:32):
of us here to be able towork with you directly on that, Diana,
So thank you. Thank you somuch for that Number one. Number
two talk about protecting kids in pets, that partnership and the direct mission.
Well, first of all, Ihave to say to you, Desmond's Law
would not have happened without you.And I wish that everyone in the public
seriously knew that. You are amazingin your ability to reach out to people
(02:57):
to get people concerned, and thereally critical part is to get people to
get to their legislators to make thatextra step, and you are so successful
in that. And I can't everthank you enough for the time that was
spent together. Yeah, and we'regonna spend a lot more time together if
I have anything to do with it. In essence, what I'm looking at
(03:23):
right now is everybody I think isfamiliar with red flag laws, and in
other states they're called extreme protection orders. What it is is when somebody does
a violent act, for instance,there's donastic violence, and there's a restraining
order, and that person has agun. The law says, let's take
(03:45):
that gun away from them for aperiod of time so that we can figure
out whether they are going to commitan act of violence, whether they are
so immersed in this anger at whateverthe person, the wife, the child,
that they will continue and actually usethat weapon. So it's a way
of trying to increase the net ofprotection. So what I am doing is
(04:12):
the university, which happened to beJohn Hopkins, which originally suggested these orders
of extreme protection in that they suggestedanimal cruelty should be a part of what
the judge is looking at when he'sdeciding the or she sorry the or she
is deciding whether to have that orderperpetrated. So when I checked out the
(04:36):
twenty one states that have these extremeorders of protection are red flag laws,
none of them have animal cruelty.So that is the quest right now,
is to recognize that we should haveanimal cruelty extreme acts of violence against animals
as an indicator that maybe, andI'm not saying maybe we should take that
(04:59):
if that person has as a gun, that we should be taking the gun
away for a period of time toreevaluate where that person's psyche is, what
they're really angry about. But rememberthey've already acted out, so you're worrying
when they act up right. Iwas just gonna let me interject right here
(05:19):
because I know a lot of peoplelistening right now. I can almost even
feel everything that's being fought right now. What you're saying. Essentially, if
someone already has a criminal record andhas proven to have done acts of violence
on whether it be animals or children, there should be there should be questions,
comments and concerns whether that person doeshave a gun. I'm not certain
(05:43):
how someone would disagree with that,but I know people have their opinions.
We're not a political program, andI just want to make sure that that
is very clear. But that's whatthis particular organization is, protecting kids and
pets, ensuring that if someone doeslisten, whatever you want to do,
that is your right. This isa free country. If you want to
have a gun, I have agun. If you don't, you don't.
But what we're saying here, orwhat you're saying with this particular law
(06:03):
or partnership would mean, it's justthat if you have been shown to have
a criminal past in history, ifyou've been shown to have a violent history
in past, maybe there should bea better checks and balanced system. Am
I breaking that down a bit?Is that boiling down to to make it
simple? Absolutely? One hundred percent. That's exactly what we're saying, and
(06:24):
I believe that any I mean rightnow, I have three grandkids, Like
I never thought I was going toget old, but all of a sudden,
I have three grand kids. I'mlike, Wow, how'd that happen?
I worry every day that when they'regoing to school, they're going to
public school. I know that momsand dads and grandmas and grandpas and cousins,
(06:45):
they're worried because you can't find apattern of which schools these people might
go to, But we can recognizea pattern of animal abuse and violence.
So if we put that animal abuseinto the equation, and somebody stabs a
pitbull twenty seven times and they havea gun, and they go to court,
and we say, well, waita second, we need to take
(07:08):
that gun away for a period oftime, and in some states it's two
weeks, in some states it's amonth, and then they reevaluate whether they're
going to give them the gun back, because you want to see, what
are we dealing with. Is thisperson a possible risk to take that gun
and remember what I said school shootersforty three percent started with it. Well,
(07:29):
it's an animal take that gun,you know, and so animal abuse
usually starts. That's that's usually thebeginning of most violent criminals. I mean,
that's an FBI stat And also weknow the link between animal abuse and
domestic abuse. And what I wouldlike to let people know is that when
Diana was here in Connecticut a staterepresentative, she was the first one in
the country that started the cross postingbill between Animal Control and Department of Children's
(07:50):
and Families, which is now inI don't know how many states, but
where if you were called to ahouse and you were called there as a
police officer because of a violent situation, because of human violence, and there
was a child in the house,and you would let DCF know, and
then DCF would come out, andif they knew that there was a pet
there, then they would let animalcontrol officers know. So it's cross posting.
Is it a perfect system? It'snot, but it's there in place,
(08:11):
and it has saved lives. Sothat's pretty impressive. Well, what
I would say to you, andI thank you so much for mentioning that
we keep data on it and yes, we can show you where we've been
able to intervene and save a child'slife. Now, come on, if
we can do that, why don'twe do it also with the red flag
(08:33):
laws. I want to save lives. I've said this so many times as
I was working so hard to getDesmond's law, get people to recognize that
it's an act of violence. Ithaunts me the children that we might have
saved had we taken animal cruelty.Seriously, it haunts me. So for
people listening to us, you know, this is a new organization, this
(08:54):
is something that's getting started right now. The website is still working anew but
it will be and hopefully at thetime of the year of this program.
What do you hope the website tobe is where people can get more information,
Diana, I hope it will beprotecting kids. But let me look
at it again, and we wantto make sure we send people to the
right place. Dinect All right,it's protecting Kids and Pets dot com all
(09:20):
lower case, protecting Kids in Petsdot com. Sure I know what I'm
doing. Yes, Sure, protectingKids and Pets dot com all lowercase.
And we want people to go thereget information. See what it's all about.
Take a moment, take a deepbreath before you hear certain things out
of this conversation that are taking outof context. Right. We want people
to understand this is completely just toprotect kids and pets. This would be
(09:43):
for violent offenders. This would questiontheir ownership of any arms that could possibly
hurt other people, not just children. But of course we would love to
save our kids. These shootings thatcontinue to happen our heartbreaking. And if
we can make a little difference,boy, wouldn't that be a better world?
Protecting Kids and Pets dot com dotcom the organization is Protecting Kids and
Pets partnership. Diana Urban, ourformer state representative, still working hard and
(10:09):
I know you've written some books.I know you have a sanctuary farm.
I know that you are still workingwith Desmond's Law here in the state of
Connecticut, which provides at no costto a tax paper kids and youth who
are are older people for career chainswho are looking to be lawyers, real
trial courtroom experience, to help andgive a voice to the voiceless, help
build a case to get a justpunishment for those who are doing just hainous
(10:31):
crimes. To voiceless animals who alsogo on to commit these crimes against human
beings, or in some cases it'sboth at the same time. So thank
you so much for all you've doneand all you do here to keep our
kids and our pets safe. Diana. Oh well, let me tell you
this, in case people are interested, I've decided that I will make myself
(10:54):
available to PPAs, to Chambers ofCommerce to lead the women voters to come
and speak. And the only thingI'm going to charge you are my expenses,
so maybe gas and you have tobuy me lunch or something and speak
on this and then let people askquestions and clarify everything that we're trying to
do. So it would be wonderfulif you know, people listening to this
(11:18):
say, you know what, I'dlike her to come to our PTA.
And I'm focused on New England rightnow, so any place in New England,
but particularly Connecticut. That's where youknow this. I got my start
with this, and that's where you, my dear were there to help,
and Desmond's army was there, andyou know, people came together. Jessica
Rubin at Yukon, they came togetherand we got it done so well.
(11:43):
There's a special place in my heart. Absolutely, Diana. What's what's an
email? If somebody's listening right nowand they want to contact you to have
you out there, what's the bestplace in How's how should they contact you
right right now? The email thatwe're using is d as in Diana s
as in Sam jay as in Jack, thank you as an under twenty two
the number twenty two at gmail dotcom. So say that we say that
(12:05):
email again said go ahead, bas in Diana s as in Sam jay
as in Jack, you as anunder twenty two at gmail dot com.
All right, thank you so much. Former state Representative Diana Urban chatting with
us today about this new partnership protectingKids and Pets partnership website lowercase protecting Kidsanpets
(12:30):
dot com. It's always a pleasureto have you here on Iheartcommunities
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