Taxman may come for Wake's cats, dogs

Wake County wants to put a tax on dogs and cats of up to $30 a year -- an idea that is making some veterinarians, pet owners and animal advocates bristle.

Under a proposal that county commissioners still must approve, the annual tax would start in July and be levied on every dog and cat. The licensing tax would be $15 for a dog or cat that had been spayed or neutered; $30 for non-fixed canines and felines. Residents could get a bargain on three-year licenses -- $40 for fixed animals; $80 for those not spayed or neutered.

If all of the estimated 86,000 county pets were licensed, Wake would take in $2.5 million annually and the tax would replace pet license fees in Raleigh, Cary and Garner.

Veterinarians administering rabies vaccinations would be required to report whether a dog or cat had been licensed. That has some vets saying they don't want to be the taxman's snitch.

"As a veterinarian, I consider myself to be a family health practitioner, not a revenue collector for the county or the city," said Joe Gordon, a vet with Oberlin Animal Hospital in Raleigh.

He and the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals of Wake County also fear that the requirement would result in more owners deciding not to take their dog or cat to the vet for care.

"People are going to fly under the radar on this," said Hope Hancock, executive director of SPCA of Wake County. "It's going to be a dissuasive factor to go see a vet."

She said the SPCA is in favor of a countywide fee, but it doesn't like the role veterinarians would be forced to play.

County officials, vets and the SPCA agree on the tax's goal -- encouraging pet owners to spay and neuter their animals.

Funded by owners

The proposal, an initiative from the county's public service department, is still in the draft stages. It must be vetted by the Wake environmental services board before being presented to county commissioners. The ordinance also would have a public hearing, but no date has been set.

The tax, which is double Raleigh's existing pet fees, would shift part of the fiscal burden of animal services to pet owners and away from the county's general fund.

Tommy Esqueda, Wake's director of environmental services, expects pet owners would be slow to comply -- only 10 percent in the first year. The department wants the program to reach 50 percent compliance in five years. If animal control officers tracked down a pet that hadn't been taxed, its owner would be hit with a $100 fine.

The pet tax is based on a decade-old plan used in New Hanover County, which has seen almost 80 percent of pet owners pay registration fees, said Jane McNeil, director of the coastal county's animal services. Fees from licensing and other services pay almost all of her department's $900,000 operating budget.

Esqueda hopes the tax would pay for more employees for an understaffed animal control department and to fund some of the county's $4 million animal shelter expansion, which is also slated to begin in July.

Elsewhere in the Triangle, Orange and Durham counties use rabies cards to track owners and charge similar two-tiered rates. The rate for spayed and neutered pets in both counties is lower than the rates in Wake's proposed tax.

Pets could be spurned

Sherry Hill is leery. Three years ago, she and her husband, Len, adopted Ruffin, a white Samoyed puppy they found abandoned by Shelley Lake in North Raleigh.

If the tax goes through, Hill thinks more owners won't take their pets to the vet. They might orphan their dog or cat -- just as Ruffin was.

"You know how people get animals, and if there's anything like cost or responsibility that they weren't expecting, they just abandon them," she said.