Council to Decide if Pigs Should Be Pets : Animals: If licensing is allowed, keeping a household swine will be less complicated, expensive.

For years, they have lived the life of pint-size fugitives, ground-hugging outlaws trying to stay one step ahead of the authorities.

Pot-bellied pigs, the low-rider of the swine family, were all the rage a few years ago, becoming the pet of choice for about 4,000 Los Angeles residents, including teen idol Luke Perry.

But someone forgot to tell them that in the city of Los Angeles, you can’t house a pig in your home unless you go through a long and expensive zoning variance process.

That may change next week when the Los Angeles City Council considers licensing pigs as exotic pets, allowing them and their owners to become legit in the eyes of the law.

One of the leaders in the crusade to legalize the animals is Kathie Ward, who runs a pot-bellied pig rescue program in Northridge and owns three of them: Elroy, Silly Suzy Boy and Clarabel.

All are smart, clean and personable animals that should be allowed to join cats, dogs and birds in the ranks of domestic pet, she said. In fact, Clarabel even suffers the very human addiction of watching hour after hour of the Home Shopping Network, Ward said.

“Thank God she doesn’t know how to dial the phone,” Ward said.

Ward and other pig owners have been lobbying council members via phone calls and letters for the past few weeks in hopes of changing the law.

But pig aficionados face a tough battle because the city’s Planning Department strongly opposes pig licensing and has already persuaded the council’s planning committee to recommend against it.

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In a report to council members, the Planning Department has argued that pot-bellied pigs are a passing fad that does not warrant a change in the city’s licensing laws.

“Pot-bellied pigs/swine have not and do not share the same historic place and symbolic relationship with humans that cats and dogs do and should not be considered the same as these domestic animals,” the report says.

The report goes on to argue that such pigs can grow to 300 pounds, are aggressive and tend to have nasty dispositions. It also warns that “the health risks to humans are greater with pigs than with cats and dogs” because diseases are harder to detect on a pig’s pinkish skin than on other furry domestic pets.

Steve Ciccarelli, the planning associate who wrote the report, said his department has more important things to deal with than having to keep track of the tiny porkers.

“How in the world do you regulate this?” he said.

The city can now issue a variance permit that allows pigs in residential homes, but approval requires a public hearing and up to $4,000 in fees to pay for the cost of notifying neighbors about the hearing.

On Nov. 21, the council’s Planning and Land Use Committee agreed with the Planning Department and voted against the licensing plan. The council is scheduled to take up the issue on Wednesday.

Luckily for Ward and other pig lovers, the Department of Animal Regulation has taken up their cause by challenging the Planning Department’s report.

In a responding letter, Gary Olsen, general manager of the Department of Animal Regulation, said pot-bellied pigs are still a popular pet and are the subject of many articles in veterinary journals.

In addition, pot-bellied pigs can be kept at a trim 85 to 120 pounds with the proper diet and exercise, Olsen said in the report. As for reports that pigs have nasty tempers, he points out that there are 6,000 reports annually of dog and cat bites in the city and so far no pig bite reports.

Olsen also rejects the contention that pot-bellied pigs are a greater health risk than dogs or cats.

“There is no merit or indication to the statement that health risks to humans are greater with pigs than with cats and dogs,” he said.

If approved, the pig license would cost about $160, even though a regular dog license is only $10--a difference that also angers pig owners.

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Whatever the outcome of the debate, pig owners say, they will stand by their petite porkers.

Hurley and Joann, a retired couple from Van Nuys, have been looking over their shoulder for months since they adopted Sam, a 150-pound pig, and Jesse, a 35-pound miniature pot-bellied pig. (Like other pig owners, they asked that their last names not be published for fear of losing their pets.) “We are worried,” Hurley said. “We didn’t know at first that it was against the law.”

Still, the couple said they plan to keep the pigs, even if it means continuing to live outside the law.

The pigs were originally owned by Hurley’s son, who brought them to Van Nuys for a visit from Las Vegas. But once Sam saw Hurley’s back yard, he fell in love with the open space and refused to leave. No one was able to force Sam back to Vegas, so Hurley said the two pigs became permanent pets.

“One sleeps under my bed and the other sleeps under my wife’s bed,” Hurley said with a laugh.

He added that in general, they are considerate pets that don’t make, er, pigs of themselves.

“They holler for their supper, but so do dogs,” Hurley said. “They have picked one spot in the yard where they do their business so there is only one spot to clean.”

Jamie, another outlaw pig owner from North Hollywood, said her two pigs, Wilbur and Ophelia, have learned to open doors and cabinets and both sleep on a mattress in the house.

Wilbur was born deaf, but Jamie said he responds to hand signals that instruct him to sit, roll over and lie down.

“They don’t dig, they don’t bark, they really don’t have too many drawbacks,” she said.