Burbank Gives OK for Pigs to Call City Home

Relax, Burbank pig-lovers. It’s OK to bring home the bacon.

Grabbing one of the city’s hottest issues by the tail, the Burbank City Council has reversed a city ordinance that prohibited the keeping of potbellied pigs.

The decision should bring squeals of delight from a certain Vietnamese potbellied pig named Arnold, the beloved pet of two Burbank men.

City officials tried to evict Arnold, a 45-pound miniature porker with a bulging belly, from his home in October, prompting a lot of huffing and puffing from his owners.

The council ruled Tuesday that Vietnamese potbellied pigs could be kept as domestic pets in Burbank, within limits. The pigs must weigh less than 100 pounds, there can be only one pig per household, and their owners will have to get a permit from the Burbank Animal Shelter superintendent.

Arnold’s keeper, Robert Ridenour, was cited by police for keeping the pig at his Grinnell Drive home. Police have never revealed who reported the porker.

Pigs were on the list--along with lions, tigers, bears and more then 80 other species--of animals prohibited under the Burbank Municipal Code.

“We have an ordinance that says no pigs. It’s as simple as that,” Fred DeLange, superintendent of the Burbank Animal Shelter, said at the time of the citation, “It doesn’t say anything about Vietnamese potbellied pigs. It just says no pigs.”

But Ridenour cried porker prejudice, saying that Arnold was more a pet than a pig. He said the ordinance was aimed at 800-pound sows who compete for blue ribbons at county fairs.

Arnold is not only housebroken, but has been trained to come when called, sit on command and climb up stepladders, Ridenour claimed.

Arnold had been given to Ridenour and his roommate, Steve Erhardt, by Jackie Stallone, the mother of Sylvester Stallone, late last summer. The pig had originally been intended as a birthday gift for one of her sons, but he apparently turned up his nose at it.

The roommates were to watch Arnold until a permanent home could be found. But the two grew attached to the pig, which they said is smarter and cleaner than their dog, Oki.

Miniature Vietnamese pigs are short and black with round bellies that nearly drag on the ground. Some yuppie Southern California animal lovers have adopted them as chic pets, sometimes paying as much as $3,500 for one, officials with the Southern California Potbellied Pig Assn. said.

The National Animal Disease Center, a branch of the U. S. Department of Agriculture, has said the pigs pose less of a health threat to humans than dogs or cats. They added that when cared for properly, the pigs are cleaner than most domestic pets.

Still, many cities are anti-pig.

In September, the city of Monterey Park became the first in the county to allow residents to keep one Vietnamese potbellied pig per household.

Ridenour had said that if the council did not allow the miniature pigs to live in peace, he might have challenged the ordinance in court.

He could not be reached for comment Wednesday, but perhaps Ridenour has changed his mind about the city of Burbank being pig-headed.