For several years, Annie Zurth worried that a person might get hurt due to the seeming rise of loose and uncontrolled dogs in her mother's westside Petaluma neighborhood, and on May 27, her fears became a reality.
"My 76-year-old mother and our 12-year-old dog were attacked by a pit bull. The dog was on a leash, but the young girl who was with it had no control over it, and it dragged her across the street, where it bit my mom, but missed our dog," said Annie Zurth. "For months, there has been a problem with loose dogs in the area, and the pit bull situation has gotten out of control.
"The inevitable finally happened."
Also, animals straying off owners' property and animals found off-leash have been growing problems in Petaluma, partly because the Petaluma Animal Shelter has one less animal control officer to patrol the city. The number of reports made has plummeted from 366 in 2008 to 60 in 2010.
After the recent incident, Ilse Zurth was taken to the emergency department at Petaluma Valley Hospital, where the four hand punctures she suffered were treated and she was given a tetanus shot.
Then, on May 31, Ilse Zurth was walking in the Payran neighborhood, just west of Highway 101, when she came upon a woman walking three dogs, all off-leash.
"My mom had to turn around and go the other way," Annie Zurth said.
And now, she is very wary of walking in her neighborhood.
"Ever since a bike trail from Payran Street to McDowell Boulevard was put in, this has been an out-of-control, free-for-all dog area," said Annie Zurth, a lifelong Petaluma resident who now lives on Thompson Lane, but often walks in her mother's neighborhood.
She plans to speak with Petaluma Animal Shelter personnel about the recent incidents involving her mother. She spoke with them a few months ago, and says that they explained to her the difficulties of patrolling the entire city with only two animal control officers.
Jeff Charter, the director of the Petaluma Animal Shelter, says that based on reports he has received, the Payran Street neighborhood, in general, hasn't been a particular problem spot.
"There are a quite a few dogs off leash on the bike trail, though. Some people seem to think when they're away from their homes, it's OK to let their dogs off leash," he said.
Charter says that city regulations require people walking dogs to use a large leash and be physically capable of controlling them.
"But occasionally, they don't, usually due to a poor decision on the part of a parent who gives the leash to a child who can't control the animal," he said. "This isn't a large problem in our community, though."
He says that the pit bull breed should not be singled out as the main culprit in the attacks.
"We have no larger problem with pit bulls than with any other type of dog," Charter said.
Charter says that it has been more difficult to keep animals under control since the shelter's animal control officers were reduced from three to two in August of 2009 due to budget cuts. Currently, one officer is on patrol at a given time during daytime hours each day except for Saturday, when their schedules overlap. They are on call during late night and early morning hours.
The shelter made 80 aggressive-animal reports in 2009, and this fell to 55 in 2010 and 35 so far this year. In 2009, there were 17 reported dog bites, compared with 13 in 2010 and eight so far this year.
The biggest drop was in reports of animals being off the owners' property and at large. Whereas 366 reports were made in 2008, the number dropped to 112 in 2009 and 60 in 2010, although 68 already have been made in 2011.
"I would like to have a third officer back so that we could have more officer presence on the streets and in the parks," he said.
Charter also attributes the general decrease in reports and incidents to Petaluma residents' changing lifestyle.
"I think that people are at home more, and animals are not left alone a much as they used to be," he said.
(Contact Dan Johnson at dan.johnson@arguscourier.com)
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