Laguna Niguel Residents Urge City to Use Different Animal Shelter : Hearing: Group claims county pound ignores pets. They want shift to new Mission Viejo facility.

Saying that county workers ignore pets and pet owners in South County, a group of local animal lovers asked the City Council on Tuesday to leave the county’s animal control program and join the new Mission Viejo city-run animal shelter.

Animal lovers accused the county agency of being slow to respond to injured and lost pets and of euthanizing unlicensed animals as soon as the mandatory three-day holding period is over.

“We care about our animals,” resident Diane Argyle said. “We are not happy at all with the services of the county. It is not acceptable to kill any healthy animal.”

But Judy Maitlen, the county’s animal control director, said that the county shelter has a pro-humane policy and that her office has received no complaints about ongoing service problems from Laguna Niguel residents.

“If you want to have a shelter right across the freeway, that’s your choice to make,” Maitlen told the council. “But please don’t make your decision based on a perception that we kill animals after three days. We don’t have a need to do that.

Her comments drew angry shouts from animal lovers in the audience, who said that they prefer Mission Viejo’s policy of keeping all healthy, unclaimed animals alive indefinitely by giving them to the Friends of Mission Viejo Animals.

They also said that telephone lines at the county shelter are constantly busy, forcing many people to give up trying to find lost pets.

The animal advocates also said the proximity of the $2.3-million Mission Viejo shelter would improve response times.

City Manager Tim Casey estimated that joining the Mission Viejo shelter would cost the city about $20,000 to $30,000 more per year than the current county contract.

In addition, the city would probably be required to pay $75,000 to $100,000 to expand the Mission Viejo shelter.

The council is expected to make a decision at its Dec. 20 meeting.