Fresno halts licenses for unspayed, unneutered dogs. Illegal breeders face $1,000 fines

Fresno has put a temporary halt to issuing licenses for dogs that aren’t spayed or neutered as it seeks to clamp down on backyard breeders and puppy mills — part of an effort to reduce animal overpopulation and unwanted strays within the city limits.

The unanimous 7-0 vote of the Fresno City Council earlier this month came as the Fresno Animal Center, the city-owned and operated shelter, continues to be overcrowded with several times more dogs than it was designed to hold.

“It’s a crisis; it really is,” said Council President Annalisa Perea when she and Councilmember Garry Bredefeld introduced the measure.

The council’s action also establishes misdemeanor penalties including a fine of $1,000 for owners who breed or sell a dog without a license for an unspayed or unneutered animal, and calls for the development of a citywide program to reduce unauthorized breeding. Breeders will be assessed the $1,000 fine for each puppy sold from litters whelped by unlicensed dogs.

The moratorium on licenses for dogs that are not spayed or neutered will be in place for at least three months, and likely longer. It will be lifted only when the dog population at the Fresno Animal Center dips to 75% of its 100-dog capacity and stays at or below that level for three consecutive months.

As of mid-June, there were about 230 dogs at the shelter near Fresno Yosemite International Airport, Perea said. The Fresno Animal Center opened in the summer of 2022, and the city’s new Animal Services Department took over operations in December.

But since, the center has been turning away healthy lost or stray dogs and cats at the direction of the City Council because of overcrowding at the shelter — as many as 500 dogs at that time, city officials reported.

The higher the concentration of dogs over the shelter’s capacity, City Manager Georgeanne White said, the higher the rates of animals that are euthanized for two reasons: the potential for serious or even fatal canine diseases to sweep through the kennels, and the simple lack of room.

“We can’t have it both ways,” White said. “We can’t have 500 animals in a shelter that is set up for 100.”

She added: “We have to stop the problem where it is starting, and that’s with these backyard, illegal breeders.”

Bredefeld agreed. The city, he said, needs to “become a leader in making sure illegal breeding comes to an end and that people who are truly (responsible) breeders are doing the good work of breeding.”

What are Fresno’s license requirements?

Dogs over the age of 4 months are required to be licensed in the city of Fresno, whether or not they have been spayed or neutered, but it is believed that the number of unlicensed pets is likely in the tens of thousands.

“We all know that not everyone gets a license to breed; they just go out and breed,” Perea said. “So what this does is it sets fines for people that are breeding without a license.”

“These breeders,” she added, “are breeding a lot faster than we can save these poor animals. It’s about time that we do more to step up and stop this crisis on our streets.”

Currently, Fresno has two tiers of licenses for dogs in the city limits: $12 per year or $30 for a three-year license for spayed or neutered pets, and $50 per year or $135 for three years for unaltered dogs. But, White said, the city has no specific license requirement for dog breeders.

The original version of the proposal on June 13 called for tiered fines for owners of puppies born to unlicensed dogs: $500 for a first violation, $750 for a second and $1,000 for any subsequent violations.

“But I don’t think that’s enough,” Perea said as she and Bredefeld withdrew that version, opting instead to postpone consideration by one week to June 20 to toughen up the penalties.

“While we don’t have the answers to everything today, part of what we’re doing is providing direction to the city manager to develop and bring back a program,” Perea said when the proposal came back to the council on June 20. “This item today provides some immediate solutions, some interim solutions, and it gives us some time to further develop this program to make sure that we get it right the first time.”

While the measure does not specify the particulars of a program to regulate breeders in Fresno, it does require advertisements to give away or sell puppies to “prominently display” proof that they have a license for the unaltered parent.

The breeder must also disclose the city’s dog license requirements to the buyer or recipient of a puppy.

In an additional step, any commercial business that allows the sale of pets without an unaltered dog license is also subject to the misdemeanor fines.

Bredefeld suggested last month that the city could establish a distinct dog-breeding license, potentially for a fee of up to $5,000 “because they’re making lots of money on this.”