County on the tail of unlicensed dog breeders
By MERRILL BALASSONE
BEE STAFF WRITER
Last Updated: April 5, 2006, 06:43:44 AM PDT
It's 7 a.m., and Animal Services officer Steve Giblin is leafing through the newspaper classifieds for breeders advertising puppies for sale.
He sits in an unmarked white sedan near where the bodies of euthanized animals are being carted away. He's on his cell phone, posing as a potential buyer. He chats with sellers about the merits of a hunting dog for his father or pretends to be a first-time owner looking for a good family dog.
"I call and I play stupid and ask, 'Is that a good dog?'" said Giblin, 35. "It's me playing off them. If I sense they want me to sound like a breeder or if they want me to be a street fighter, I'll ask what the 'chain weight' of the dog is � the weight the dog maintains while training."
Giblin only recently began enforcing a Stanislaus County ordinance passed in June. Among other things, it requires breeders to get a "litter license," which limits them to one litter per year in an attempt to curb animal overpopulation.
Of the more than 20,000 dogs and cats brought into Animal Services in the fiscal year 2004-05, nearly 15,000 were euthanized. Nearly 60 percent of dogs at the shelter are killed after the end of the state-mandated five-day waiting period.
As Giblin sits in his car on a recent Thursday morning, workers at Stanislaus County Animal Services euthanize 15 dogs with a quick shot of a substance called Fatal Plus in a syringe.
"The big thing is having to kill all these animals," Giblin said. "So many of them are good animals that you could put with any family in the county."
Before his first morning appointment, Giblin stops at a gas station for his morning cup of coffee. The cashier recognizes Giblin but comments on his street clothes � a black sweat shirt and jeans.
"You don't have your uniform on today," she says.
Giblin has been enforcing the ordinance full time for six days, but it became obvious to him that the most effective way to uncover violations, or even to be let inside a house, is to go undercover.
"It's a hostile encounter the moment they spot you coming around the corner," he said.
Dave Young, the department's interim director, said when they first began enforcement in October, officers would call breeders and inform them they were in violation of the ordinance by advertising in the paper without including their litter license number. What the officers got were mostly hang-ups and profanity.
"There was virtually zero compliance," Young said. "It was a good indication that there needed to be strict enforcement."
Since October, Young said, 78litter licenses have been sold.
At 9 a.m., Giblin reaches the house of 31-year-old Tanya Sangster, who is selling 15 French mastiff puppies, which Giblin says are "the new pit bulls," at $800 to $1,200 apiece.
While Sangster spent $400 licensing her four dogs five days earlier, she didn't spend the extra $100 for a litter license to breed her dogs. Giblin issues her a citation, giving Sangster 30days to get the license before she would be fined $500.
"You can only afford what you can afford at one time," said Sangster, who makes $10,000 per year breeding puppies. "I do understand the overpopulation, but these dogs are so wanted. You won't find these dogs in the pound."
Many breeders have spoken out against the ordinance, saying it unfairly targets "responsible breeders" who already pay licensing fees for their dogs. The breeders say officers should focus their efforts on eliminating "puppy mills," where dogs are often mistreated and are bred several times a year for large profits.
"The 'puppy mills' are a nice villain, but your random citizen will bury them in terms of the raw numbers they're breeding," Giblin said. "That's why we're enforcing this on everyone."
"I don't want to punish people, to be the dog Nazi, but that woman, I don't think she realizes she's part of the problem," Giblin said of Sangster. "Some people ask me on the phone what I want the dog for and what my expectations are, and that's good. But if I had pulled out a whole handful of bills and bought the whole litter, I don't think (Sangster) would have asked any questions."
Later that morning, Giblin is eyeing a Pomeranian puppy in the parking lot of a Modesto Denny's.
Martha Philips, 57, is cited for selling in public and failure to display a litter permit. Philips vows she will go to court to fight the citation because she lives outside the county.
"Are you just trying to get everyone?" she asks Giblin. "They should make people more aware, it's not fair."
"I don't see the problem," said Kelly Jones, 31, a customer who came from Herald, north of Lodi, to look at Philips' dogs. "We can go to pet stores, we can go anywhere to buy (dogs). You should go after the puppy mills."
Because the ordinance is fairly new, Giblin urges people who feel they were cited wrongly to fight their citation in court so precedent can help guide his enforcement. While he doesn't go outside county lines to issue citations, Giblin said anyone who sells within the county could be cited. The ordinance applies to unincorporated parts of the county as well as Modesto, Ceres, Newman, Patterson, Hughson and Riverbank. Oakdale and Turlock have their own animal control departments and are not bound by the ordinance.
Giblin may spend most of his day around dogs, but he doesn't own one. Instead, he keeps a pet pig named Dolly.
After two and a half years with Animal Services, he said euthanizing unwanted pets has had an impact on his ability to relate to dogs as companions. He can't help being affected by the images of dead fighting dogs or their victims, their bodies tied up and burned alongside rural roads.
"I've seen plenty of people that breed dogs, and they could be responsible breeders, but they get divorced or lose their job and then they have a back yard full of angry purebred dogs," he said. "Nobody sees themselves as the problem, and that's pretty universal."
Bee staff writer Merrill Balassone can be reached at 578-2337 or
http://www.modbee.com/local/story/1...-12776597c.html
The Ordinance
Highlights of the animal ordinance adopted June 21 by Stanislaus County:
The annual license fee for spayed or neutered dogs is $12.
The cost to license an unaltered dog is $100 per year, up from $28.
Pet owners who want to breed their dogs or cats will be required to buy a $100 annual permit that allows them one litter per year. A breeding permit number must be displayed at the time of purchase. Those in violation face fines up to $500.
Unaltered, documented working dogs or show dogs can be licensed at the current rate of $28.
A SCATE, or Stanislaus County Alternate to Euthanasia, voucher can be purchased for $50 at Stanislaus County Animal Services for dogs or cats, which includes a microchip implanted in the pet with the owner�s information, a 6-month license, a rabies shot and other vaccinations and a voucher for a free spay or neuter with participating veterinarians.
http://www.modbee.com/local/story/12...12776782c.html