INDEPENDENCE, Mo. — Seventeen years after an Independence man was attacked by multiple Pitbull’s he’s voicing his concern with lifting the Pitbull ban.

“I Put my hands across my chest, and I said ‘Lord please don’t let me die like this,’ and I laid there bleeding, getting weaker and weaker,” Alan Hill, who was attacked by multiple Pitbulls said.

The ban on this specific breed of dog has been in place for nearly two decades following Hill’s attack.

Now a group of organizers is trying to get that taken off the books. Friday, they got one step closer as their petition was approved by the city. But all aren’t in favor of lifting this ordinance.

They will need a total of 3,500 signatures in the next 30 days. They plan to start the grassroots work Tuesday at the polls. Hill, who was almost killed, says the ban must stay.

“This is my bad arm, this got all tore up. You can see the scars on it, scars on this, this arm all tore up,” Hill said.

Hill was mowing the lawn at one of his properties in Independence when the attack started.

That attack was so bad the pictures were too gruesome to show. His clothes were ripped off him and left bloodied. Doctors weren’t sure if he would live or die

“I just feel so strong, these scars and stuff don’t show what happened to me. I was in the hospital for four months. I was in there for 30 days in the ICU on a ventilator,” Hill said.

So, he, his wife Connie and his sister led the charge to help get enough signatures to get pit bulls banned in Missouri’s fifth-largest city, and it worked. Now, for nearly two decades, that has been the law in Independence.

“We have a dangerous dog ordinance in place already that covers animals of all breeds. Pit bulls are great dogs. It’s not the dog, it’s the owner and how they’re raised,” Miriam Keith, who is advocating for the ban to be lifted said.

A new group of organizers is now doing the same thing Hill did, except they want the ban gone.

“You can’t punish all dogs based on the actions of a few. If we punish the owner instead of the whole breed it would be more fair,” Keith said.

KC Pet Project, which takes in every case in Kansas City when a dog bites a human. They told FOX4 their data shows that pit bulls are not more prone to biting humans or being violent compared to other breeds of dogs.

“I understand they’re going to gather signatures. I think that’s good, they need to bring it before the council and I think the council needs to put it up to a vote of the people,” Hill said.

Keith acknowledges that the efforts to repeal this ban before have all failed but says this time is different.

“This time I think we really have the push that we need and the number of people we need to actually get it done,” Keith said.

Now the organizers will need 3,500 signatures in the next 30 days. They will turn them over to the city clerk’s office, who will then pass that to the Jackson County Board of Elections to verify.

If those are verified, the city council will either vote to get rid of the ban or leave that up to voters on the August ballot.