By: Rita Cook
AUSTIN – Most people love an animal feel good story.
Especially amid all that is going on in the world that is not feeling good.
The Texas Human Legislation Network (THLN) celebrated a feel good victory for animal lovers when HB 2731 authored by Representative Muñoz and Representative Bell passed in the Texas 89th legislative session.
The law was effective in late 2025.
In short, for people buying and selling animals on the side of the road and in parking lots, this has now been severely restricted or banned.
Texas HB 2731 permits Texas counties more power to manage roadside sales with an eye toward focusing on problematic animal sales and protecting livestock trade.
It allows counties with populations over 200,000, which was expanded from 870,000 for border counties to regulate roadside vendors selling live animals or soliciting on public highway rights-of-way.
The law also gives county commissioner courts the ability to regulate the sale of live animals in unincorporated areas, also including parking lots and highway rights-of-way and it eliminates a previous requirement that the regulations only apply to roads with speed limits of 40 mph or faster.
It was noted by THLN that roadside sales of animals “often lead to impulse purchases, with buyers unaware that animals may be sick, poorly bred, or coming from unregulated sources. Too often, these animals are later surrendered to already overwhelmed municipal shelters, worsening Texas’ pet overpopulation crisis.”
The idea behind the legislation is that by stopping the roadside sales in these counties, the bans will help protect animals from exploitation and promote more responsible, thoughtful pet adoption and purchasing decisions.
There are already five states including California, Nevada, Virginia, Illinois, and Nebraska that have implemented state laws to forbid the roadside sale of animals. In some cases, the states include comprehensive restrictions, while other states have only limited specific animals or imposed procedural requirements.
The idea behind the ban too is that in addition to inhumane treatment, this type of selling promotes unregulated breeding and unsanitary practices in transporting, displaying, and selling of animals that often results in not only poor veterinary care, but can be wrought with the spreading of zoonotic diseases.
The new law also enables county officials to shut down these operations in outdoor public spaces like flea markets and parking lots too.
Further effects in Dallas and Tarrant counties will be contingent on the respective commissioner’s courts passing specific orders or ordinances to implement these regulations.
The bill provides the authority to do so, but not an automatic, statewide ban.
The best result from HB 2731 is the hope that in the end these regulations will serve to end or lower the immense number of animals being euthanized annually.
In a KERA news report Katie Fine, senior advocacy strategist at Best Friends Animal Society said the law makes “significant progress in breaking the supply chain for puppy mills in Texas.”
According to Best Friends Animal Society, Texas ranks number one in the country for shelter deaths with 86,000 euthanized cats and dogs annually.
