RIVERSIDE COUNTY, CA — Riverside County supervisors Tuesday signaled that municipalities that contract with the Department of Animal Services need to start finding solutions to their stray pet overpopulation problems instead of always leaning on the county, causing it to suffer adverse publicity, especially on euthanasia rates.
“It’s time to tell contract cities, ‘You need to go on your own and build your own shelters,”‘ Supervisor Kevin Jeffries said. “We’re going to have to do something different. We cannot continue to be your punching bag. Because your city has hundreds, if not thousands, of animals being turned into our (four) county shelters, nationally and internationally, we receive the criticism.”
Jeffries vented his frustrations during an otherwise routine series of contract rate adjustments for the cities of Desert Hot Springs, Hemet and Palm Desert.
The adjustments were required under the 2024-25 fiscal year budget to contend with unforeseen higher operational costs impacting the Department of Animal Services, resulting in 5% across-the-board hikes in rates, totaling roughly $1.58 million in total obligations for all three municipalities until June 30, 2025.
Most of Jeffries’ displeasure seemed to stem from last week’s announcement of a lawsuit against the county filed by four animal welfare activists in the Coachella Valley.
The suit, spearheaded by the Rancho Mirage-based Walter Clark Law Group and filed in Riverside County Superior Court, seeks a permanent injunction against the Department of Animal Services’ humane euthanasia programs.
Clark called it a “groundbreaking case” that’s predicated on the Hayden Act of 1998. That legislation, authored by then-state Sen. Tom Hayden, D-Santa Monica, states, in part, “no adoptable animal should be euthanized if it can be adopted into a suitable home.”
The measure further bars euthanization even if a pet lacks qualities that make the animal suited to immediate adoption, “but could become adoptable with reasonable efforts.”
The plaintiffs, based on data gleaned and produced by the nonprofit Best Friends Animal Society, contend that in 2022, county Department of Animal Services shelters “killed more animals than any other reporting shelter in the United States.”
Altogether, in 2022 and 2023, an estimated 24,000 canines and felines were euthanized in county shelters, according to the organization.
“We’ve been asking all these different groups that keep quoting ‘we’re the worst in the nation (for kill rates)’ where are you getting that? And it’s one group on the internet — Best Friends,” Supervisor Karen Spiegel said. “Many municipalities have the same challenges. We have had a severe amount of animals, hundreds at a time, coming into the shelters. Municipalities cannot take these animals. It’s very challenging.”
To date in 2024, she said, there have been five major seizures by animal control officers countywide, during which hundreds of dogs and cats have been impounded due to neglect, malnutrition and related factors, largely attributable to hoarding by residents ill-equipped to provide care.
Spiegel said in spite of the county now refusing to dedicate resources for contract animal control services in cities within neighboring San Bernardino County, the Department of Animal Services remains under pressure handling unincorporated communities and servicing municipalities in Riverside County.
“People need to know, not everything that’s spewed out is accurate,” the supervisor said. “And it’s not fair to continue to bad-mouth our staff.”
Jeffries said he recognized the issue of cities constructing their own shelter space “won’t be fixed overnight.”
“But how much longer can we ask our staff to take the abuse they’ve been taking on a daily basis before they finally say, ‘take my (employee) badge, I’m done’? What we’re doing now is not working.”
A few municipalities in the county maintain independent animal control services, either through city-paid personnel or contracts with nongovernmental organizations. Examples include the cities of Canyon Lake, Lake Elsinore, Menifee, Murrieta, Temecula and Wildomar that contract with Wildomar-based nonprofit Animals Friends of the Valleys. The city of Palm Springs has its own animal services department.
Last month, the board approved formation of an Ad Hoc Committee for Continuous Improvement of Animal Services, headed by Supervisors Manuel Perez and Yxstian Gutierrez.
The pair pledged to delve into the “high kill rate” allegations, as well as analyze the department’s adoption policies, data banking and distribution.
“There are a lot of issues we’ve prioritized, but this hasn’t been one of them,” Perez said. “You’re right about the cities. Eventually I think they’ll get there. Every city needs to pay their fair share. We are way behind. There is misinformation out there, partly because we have not updated our data. We need to clear up the misinformation for the public. We can all win. But we have to be willing to come together to collaborate.”
The committee is slated to hold its first meeting in the next two months.
If you are interested in adopting a pet from the Riverside County Department of Animal Services, click here.
