This petition urges the Florida Legislature to enact a narrow, carefully tailored amendment to Florida’s family law statutes (Chapter 61) to allow courts to consider the welfare of companion animals (AKA pets) in family law proceedings.

The Problem Under Current Florida Law
Under Florida law, companion animals are classified as property. Because companion animals are treated solely as property:

• Courts cannot consider a pet’s well-being in divorce proceedings
• Judges lack authority to create parenting plans
• Bonded companion animals may be separated without any evaluation of harm or disruption
• Companion animals may be used as leverage or coercive tools in high-conflict family cases, particularly in families that suffer from domestic violence
• Courts cannot allocate ongoing medical decision-making authority, care responsibilities, or financial responsibility such as veterinary expenses.

The resulting outcomes do not occur because Florida judges are indifferent to animal welfare. They occur because the current legal framework does not permit courts to recognize companion animals as living beings with needs, routines, and established bonds within a family unit.

Why This Matters in Family Law Cases
The author of this petition, Rebekah Brown-Wiseman, is a family law attorney who routinely represent's families for whom companion animals are integral members of their households. Yet under existing law, attorneys and courts are constrained in ways that prevent humane and practical outcomes.

Florida Family Law Courts cannot (1) evaluate which household provides safer or more stable care for a companion animal; (2) consider veterinary needs, caregiving history, or established routines; and (3) provide protective measures when a companion animal pet is at risk due to neglect, cruelty, or coercive conduct within the family dynamic.

Instead, companion animals are treated as objects to be awarded to one party, without consideration of the animal’s welfare or the family’s caregiving structure.

Other States Have Already Modernized Family Law
Over the past decade, multiple states have enacted family-law-specific statutes authorizing courts to consider the welfare of pets in family law proceedings.

These statutes: (1) Do not grant animals legal personhood; (2) Do not provide independent legal standing; and (3) Do not alter property classifications outside family-law contexts. They simply provide courts with limited authority to hear evidence pertaining to companion animal welfare and order outcomes that protect both companion animals and family stability.

This proposal is limited to family law, is consistent with statutes already enacted in other states, and does not create animal personhood or independent legal standing.

States that have enacted such reforms include: Alaska, California, Delaware, Illinois, Maine, New Hampshire, New York, Rhode Island, and Washington, D.C.¹ Florida remains among the states that have not yet adopted this measured, modern approach.

What This Petition Urges the Florida Legislature to Do
This petition calls for a limited amendment to Chapter 61, Florida Statutes, to authorize courts, when appropriate, to consider the welfare of companion animals in family-law proceedings, including:

• Update Florida Family Law (Chapter 61) by authorizing courts to consider the welfare and safety of a companion animal and to approve provisions addressing:
  • Protective measures where evidence of neglect, cruelty, or coercive conduct exists
  • Timeshare of the companion animal
  • Decision making responsibility such as medical decision-making (veterinary) authority
  • Allocation of expenses such as veterinary care
  • Responsibility for ongoing daily care
• Preserve existing legal classifications to limit scope to avoid opposition by expressly providing that:
  • It applies only to proceedings governed by Chapter 61
  • It does not grant legal personhood or independent legal standing to pets
  • It does not alter the classification of animals as property under Florida law outside family-law proceedings

A Measured and Proven Reform
Florida’s current legal framework leaves courts without the tools necessary to protect companion animals caught in family disputes. The proposed reform is narrowly tailored, legally conservative, and modeled on statutes already enacted in other jurisdictions.

Companion animals cannot speak for themselves in court. This petition urges the State of Florida legislature to provide a statute to grant judges with limited authority to consider companion animal welfare in family law cases.

Please Take Action
Sign this petition
Encourage Florida legislators to sponsor a companion animal family law reform bill
Share this petition with others who support humane, modern family-law policy

Footnotes
¹ Examples of enacted family-law statutes authorizing courts to consider animal welfare in family law proceedings: Alaska Stat. § 25.24.160(a)(5); California Fam. Code § 2605; Delaware Code tit. 13, § 1513 (g); D.C. Code § 16-910 (3); Illinois 750 ILCS 5/503(n); Maine Rev. Stat. tit. 19-A, § 953 (10); New Hampshire Rev. Stat. § 458:16-a(II-a); New York Dom. Rel. Law § 236(B)(5)(d)(15); Rhode Island Gen.
Laws § 15-5-30.
Pennsylvania 23 Pa. C.S. § 3102(a.1)