Panel OKs Policy Allowing Limited Coyote Trapping

The Los Angeles Animal Regulation Commission decided Tuesday to allow city employees in limited circumstances to trap and kill coyotes in residential areas, modifying its almost year-old ban on the practice but failing to satisfy homeowners and animal rights activists at odds over the issue.

Under the new policy, animal regulation officers will charge residents a $200 fee to set traps, but only after property owners meet certain conditions--for example, putting up a fence to deter coyote intrusions.

The decision by the panel culminates the latest chapter of the often-heated debate among wildlife advocates and others, who say trapping is an inhumane and ineffective policy, and homeowners, particularly in the San Fernando Valley, who maintain trapping is needed to protect pets and children from attacks.

The new policy replaces a trapping ban that residents say resulted in a dramatic increase in coyote sightings since it was adopted 11 months ago. But officials said it would have been too costly to reinstitute trapping on demand.

Several animal rights activists said the fee imposed under the new policy should be increased to more closely reflect the estimated $5,800 the city spends to set and maintain each trap. Others denounced the practice of trapping under any circumstances.

Opponents of the ban complained that the criteria are so difficult to meet that the new policy, in essence, continues the ban.

“There are so many caveats that it leaves the ban in place,” said Michael Lazarou, a Woodland Hills resident and vocal opponent of the ban, who contends that a coyote stalked his toddler son in his back yard last December.

The policy, unanimously approved by the commission, was recommended by Gary Olsen, the Animal Regulation Department’s general manager. The city will set traps for a resident only under the following circumstances:

* An animal regulation official must first visit the home of the resident who has complained about a coyote problem and provide educational material that explains the habits of the animal and ways to protect against coyote attacks.

* The official must then recommend mitigation measures, such as installing tall fences, to deter a coyote from entering the property. The resident must implement those measures before trapping can occur.

* The resident must then sign an affidavit that the measures have been implemented and agree to waive the city’s liability in case a pet or child is caught in the trap. The resident must also notify all residents within 300 yards of the property that trapping will occur.

* Once all of the above criteria are met, the city will charge the resident $200 to set and maintain a trap on the property until a coyote is caught or until an animal regulation official determines that the problem no longer exists.

The city may also allow limited trapping when a coyote is suspected of having rabies because of an attack on a person, when a county, state or federal agency mandates it due to public safety concerns, or when a coyote is sick or injured.

The commission will review the policy after a year.

Olsen said he expects the policy will dramatically reduce the number of coyotes trapped annually. During the year before the ban, the department trapped and killed 35 coyotes, city officials said. (State law requires the city to kill a trapped coyote and forbids it from relocating the animal to other areas within the state).

Before voting on the recommendation, commission President Mimi Robins said she realized that the new policy will not satisfy all sides on the highly contentious issue.

“Basically, this is an ugly issue and regardless of what the commission does, not everyone will be happy,” she said.

The trapping controversy began in June, 1993, when the commission voted--partly in response to pressure from animal rights advocates--to halt the trapping of coyotes by city employees. The panel left residents the option of hiring a certified pest control company to trap the animal. Such companies charge about $800 to trap coyotes.

But since the ban, hillside residents, mostly in the West Valley, have complained about an increase in coyote sightings and attacks on pets. A city report said the city gets about 500 calls per year about coyote sightings, but how much they have increased was not immediately available.

At a March 23 hearing in Woodland Hills, the commission instructed Olsen to suggest a trapping policy that would take into consideration the concerns from both sides of the issue.

In his report, Olsen offered four options: continue the ban, lift it outright, impose the criteria for trapping and charge a fee, or adopt the criteria and charge no fee.

Lt. Willie McDaniel, an Animal Regulation Department supervisor who drafted the list of options for the commission, said that the financially strapped city cannot afford to return to a policy of providing trapping upon request.

Several activists who had pressed for the ban on trapping said they generally support the new trapping policy, but only if the fee is increased to about $500 so that residents pay a larger share of the trapping cost.

“I don’t think this is fair,” said Norma Sandler, director of the Wildlife Protection League. “I don’t think this is equitable.”

Lila Brooks, the head of the California Wildlife Defenders who has lobbied the city for more than 20 years to ban coyote trapping, denounced the commission decision, saying the city should allow no trapping at all.

She noted that wildlife experts believe that every time a coyote is killed, the coyote population grows to fill the void. Killing coyotes, the experts maintain, results in a greater food supply for those remaining, thereby increasing the likelihood that females will have larger litters.

“This method is ineffective,” she told the commission. “Why continue a (policy) that is ineffective?”