An ordinance was approved, in Los Angeles County, on Tuesday that will give animal control officers sole authority when presiding over administrative hearings, and in declaring dogs — a danger to society.
This new law will give animal control officers the right to determine whether a dog should be euthanized, and the ability to judge them vicious. The change to Title 10 will go into effect August 31.
NBC LA reports that:
The new ordinance allows officers to consider attacks outside of their jurisdiction when judging a dog, and expands the definition of severe injury to include bites, cuts or fractures, and a heart attack suffered as a result of a dog’s aggression.
The shift in policy will save the county money because it’s expensive for tax-payers to have to cover the court cost affiliated with dog attacks. However, ruling appeals can be submitted to the county when the (dog) owner thinks the dog has been misjudged.
The new systems will give create a third party judging system that could allow for objective judging, however, the county sees it in it’s best interest to keep dog rulings outside the court system.
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