Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, October 14, 1995 TAG: 9510150010
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: S.D. HARRINGTON STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
The Saunders family of Vinton said goodbye to pet pigs Wilbur and Arnold on Friday afternoon, sending them off to Emma Saunders' uncle in Covington.
Leaning a plywood ramp into the doorway of the family van, daughter April Flowers used new potatoes to lure the Vietnamese potbellied pigs into the vehicle. Gerald Saunders gave the little porkers a push.
Most of the family members loaded up as well to see their pets off.
Lawrence Thompson has agreed to keep the pets temporarily on his farm but said he could do so only until the Saunderses have been able to defend themselves in court, Emma Saunders said.
After a long battle last summer to keep the pigs, they again are facing eviction after Town Council clarified its animal control laws, specifically outlawing potbellied pigs.
Emma Saunders said giving up Wilbur and Arnold doesn't mean she is conceding.
"They think I should just give up," she said, as the pigs gathered around her legs, waiting to be fed another handful of potatoes. "If I'm gonna go down, I'm gonna go down fighting."
She has kept Charlotte, the only female of the trio.
The strategy behind this, said Gerald Saunders, is to allow animal control officers to cite them for keeping the pigs, but unlike previously, they will not be charged with keeping more than the two-pet limit that Vinton also maintains.
They have to keep at least one pig so they can contest the issue again in court, added Emma Saunders.
She doesn't like having to send the pigs to her uncle's house, where they will be kept outside in a pen.
"These are not barnyard animals," she said. "If they stay out there all winter, they will freeze."
Also, Emma Saunders is worried about Charlotte being without her porky mates.
"I don't think she's going to like it. She's going to be real fussy at night, and not going to want to sleep," Saunders said.
Town Manager Clay Goodman said Friday that whether Charlotte is taken from the Saunderses before a court hearing will be up to the police. The new ordinance says the pigs may be confiscated, but doesn't require it, Goodman said.
Saunders said she will petition for the law to be changed again during Tuesday's council meeting, just as she did when the town tried to expel the pigs under the old law.
She also is planning a march today, with her 10 children and some neighbors who support the pigs.
"I'm not fighting for mine only. I'm fighting for everybody's," Saunders said.
Roanoke City Council recently ruled that potbellied pigs were not allowed in the city, either.
by CNB