Spay-neuter talk starts in Bakersfield, could go countywide
| Friday, Mar 14 2008 08:58 PM
Last Updated Friday, Mar 27 2009 12:57 PM
To make mandatory spay and neuter work in metropolitan Bakersfield, the city and county would need to team up.
They’d both have to pass the law.
They’d both have to enforce it.
The two entities’ animal control pasts are closely linked.
Kern County’s primary animal shelter on South Mount Vernon Avenue is on land leased from the city of Bakersfield. The county shelters all of the city’s animals.
Kern County Supervisor Mike Maggard’s proposal for a mandatory spay-neuter ordinance suggests the law be limited to the metropolitan Bakersfield area.
That geographical focus, Maggard said, is a practical tool to shrink more the number of animals euthanized in Kern County each year.
It would be easier to get Bakersfield to pass an ordinance mirroring the county’s.
“There are many other jurisdictions (across the county) and it would be more difficult to reach a consensus with those other jurisdictions,” Maggard said. “Also rural settings have different needs.”
Bakersfield is the largest population center in Kern County.
But only 8,606 of the 28,414 animals impounded by Kern County Animal Control in 2007 came from within the Bakersfield city limits.
Supervisor Don Maben said it’s fine to start with rules in one part of the county, as long as the county immediately moves on to getting the law passed countywide.
“That’s just a partial solution,” he said of Maggard’s proposal. “If I’m going to go through the pain, I want to go for the whole enchilada.”
A Bakersfield City Council committee is slated to begin looking at the issue April 14.
But at this point, the city is exploring its options, not necessarily considering a mandatory program as the county is.
“I’m just wanting to start exploring what other cities are doing, and what might be a good place for us to start to get the unwanted pet population under control,” said Councilwoman Jacquie Sullivan, who referred the issue to the council’s Legislative and Litigation Committee.
Sullivan is also a member of the committee, along with Sue Benham and David Couch.
Benham said she would like consistent policies between the city and county, and mandatory should be one option the city looks at.
The county of Kern’s consideration of mandatory spay neuter will begin Wednesday, when the Kern County Animal Control Commission meets at 6 p.m. on the first floor of 2700 M St.
