Excellent news! The United States Senate has officially passed Sen. Al Franken's bill "The Service Dogs for Veterans Act," during a late night session last week. The bill is aimed at providing more Service and Assistance Dogs to disabled veterans. The program will partner with existing non-profit groups which train Service and Assistance Dogs. The three-year pilot program aims to train dogs to assist up to 200 disabled veterans who have mental or physical disabilities. During the course of the program The National Academy of Sciences will conduct a study to measure its effectiveness.

Yesterday Al Franken wrote an article for the Minneapolis Star Tribune about his first piece of legislation as senator of Minnesota. He could have written his first bill for anything, but he chose to write it to help disabled veterans get Service Dogs.