Pet-License Canvass May End

Door-to-door pet licensing in unincorporated Spokane County may be discontinued next summer.

Spokane County Commissioners decided last week that private agents hired to sell dog and cat licenses door-to-door cannot earn commissions or impose special fees on owners of unlicensed pets.

The fees were the only way to make enough money to operate the licensing program, said Marianne Sinclair, county animal-control officer.

Commissioner Steve Hasson spearheaded the change, saying the sales crews, many of them students, are inappropriately aggressive. He attributed that to the fact that they earn commissions for each tag sold - more if a penalty is levied.

Sinclair denied there has been more than a handful of complaints about the sales agents in the eight years she has run the program. And by going door-to-door the agents talk with 15,000 pet owners a year, answer questions and educate them about animal-control laws.

“I can’t even tell you there’s been a single complaint this summer,” she said. “And I’ve got two notes thanking people for coming by.”

The canvassing program has been in effect for eight years with cats being included in 1990. Even cat licensing, once controversial, is accepted by people and pays a large share of the county’s cost for handling cats in the shelter and for returning lost cats to owners, Sinclair said.

There are about 32,000 licensed pets in the unincorporated areas of Spokane County.

This past summer, agents earned $5 an hour, plus $1 per tag sold and $5 if a dog or cat is unlicensed and the owner has to pay a penalty. Those penalties can run as high as $40 if an animal is not spayed or neutered.

An agent who moves quickly through a neighborhood can make $10 an hour, she said.

Sinclair also said the program is a boon to licensing because pet owners comply when they know agents are in the area.

“If people know we’re in their neighborhood they’ll go to the pet store and buy the tags,” she said.

Sinclair said the program is an example of how those using a government service can pay for it. The same licensing program is now being adopted by Seattle and King County.

But it may not be around Spokane next summer. Under the new policies, she doesn’t know if sales agents would work for just $5 an hour. “At first it wasn’t a problem, but in the past couple years it’s been hard to get good people,” she said.

Regardless, Sinclair has resigned her position with the county to head the Humane Society in Collier County, Florida. Any decision about the canvassing program now rests with her replacement - and county commissioners.

, DataTimes