Panel Ponders Ways to Put Teeth in Laws Designed to Take the Bite Out of Bad Dogs

Jordon Brown had been delivering mail to the house in Westminster for 10 years. And for 10 years it had been a safe house, with not even a growl from the mail carrier’s worst enemy: the dog.

But one day in 1969, a poodle bounded up the driveway and chomped him on the knee.

Brown, now president of the National Assn. of Letter Carriers, Local 1100, agreed that such incidents have always occurred. But with the upsurge of publicity surrounding attacks by pit bullterriers and other breeds of dogs, the carriers have decided to bite back, Brown said.

Brown took that message Thursday to a roundtable discussion on dog laws held at the Orange County Animal Shelter library. Eighteen representatives from Orange County Animal Control, dog training and kennel associations, municipal governments, police departments and a Huntington Beach citizens group that called the forum discussed what they consider a growing concern in the county.

Brown said leaders of the national union in Washington have instructed local union officers to sue owners of the 6,000 or so dogs around the country that seriously injure letter carriers every year. The national union also is keeping records of biting dogs and forwarding those records when an owner moves in an effort to keep track of the animals, Brown said.

Margaret Blakely, a Garden Grove kennel operator, said the Orange County Commercial Kennel Owners Assn. would begin a media campaign to get the word out about owners’ responsibilities for their pets.

But much of the discussion centered on what Shirley Carey, representing Huntington Beach’s Concerned Citizens for Dog Law Revision, called “putting pressure on the right people.” Orange County Animal Control Director Leonard M.Liberio was offered dozens of suggestions for changes in the county’s proposed vicious-dog ordinance that he has been directed to bring to the county Board of Supervisors by Sept. 22.

Those recommendations include:

- Upgrading a dog attack from a citation to a misdemeanor or felony.

- Labeling dogs “vicious” or a public nuisance before they attack.

- Placing a bright yellow collar and tattoo on those dogs to warn the public of their nature.

- Giving cited dog owners the opportunity to go to “dog school,” similar to the traffic school offered to drivers with traffic citations. The school would offer dog-training instruction and educate owners about their responsibilities.

- Gaining higher pay for animal control officers. Liberio said officers are paid between $1,387 and $1,858 a month.

- Establishing a more thorough data system to track a dog’s history. Presently, the filing is done by hand and obtaining the history of a particular dog can take hours, Liberio said.

Liberio told the group that the county has 42 animal control officers and 10 animal control sergeants serving 17 contracting Orange County cities, plus all unincorporated county territory. Those officers must respond to dog attacks, but they also field calls about mountain lions, coyotes and opossums, he added.

The department’s budget for 1987-1988 will be $5 million, Liberio said, adding that for the past three years, the county has refused to give Animal Control a computer to document dog bites and dog histories. Carey cited statistics showing that San Diego County labels as vicious about 350 dogs every year. San Mateo County declared 46 vicious in a 12-month period that it singled out for a study completed by the Huntington Beach group. Santa Barbara County declared 68 vicious last year.

Orange County declared 14 dogs vicious from July, 1986, to June, 1987, Carey said. She blamed the county’s 11-year-old vicious-dog ordinance for the comparatively low figure.

Liberio made no commitment to act on the suggestions. He did say that the county’s ordinance is one of the oldest in the state and that the changes he will recommend will be amendments, not wholesale revisions.