L.A. Council Moves to Ease Shelter Crowding With Pet-Friendly Rentals, More Officers and Spay Funds

Three unanimous motions seek limits on breed and size rules in private rentals, overnight animal control coverage and more sterilizations, weeks after an audit found shelters far over capacity.

By Herald Staff · Nov. 7, 2026, 8:30 AM ET

A brown-and-white mixed-breed dog sits behind the chain-link door of a concrete kennel with teal lower panels, warm late-afternoon sunlight slanting through a high window across a row of empty kennels. — Los Angeles' six city shelters have 737 dog kennels and 340 cat kennels; a controller's audit found they routinely hold far more animals than that.

LOS ANGELES — With all six city animal shelters still holding far more dogs and cats than they were built for, the Los Angeles City Council on Friday voted unanimously on three motions aimed at slowing the flow of animals into the system: more animal control officers, broader rights for renters to keep their pets, and more money for spaying and neutering, according to City News Service via MyNewsLA and Westside Current.

None of the votes changes policy on its own. Each one orders city departments to come back with reports, and one asks the city attorney to draft a possible ordinance. But together they are the council's first major response since City Controller Kenneth Mejia released a blistering audit of L.A. Animal Services last month.

Keeping Pets in Rental Housing

The motion with the widest reach came from Councilwoman Eunisses Hernandez. It asks housing and animal services officials to report within 90 days on the city's current pet housing rules and on ways to expand pet-friendly housing across all types of units, along with an analysis of how changes would affect housing stability, shelter intake and the city budget.

The council also asked the city attorney, working with staff, to draft a potential ordinance that would reduce or remove breed, weight and size restrictions on pets in housing that does not receive public funding. Los Angeles already bars those restrictions in publicly financed housing under a 2019 ordinance that followed a 2018 state law, the reports said.

“No one should be forced to surrender a member of their family just to stay housed,” Hernandez said during Friday's meeting. “But if you go into our shelters, you'll find time and time again how many animals and pets have actually been given up because of this issue.”

More Officers, Including Overnight

Councilwoman Monica Rodriguez introduced the other two motions. The first directs Animal Services to report on how many animal control officers it has and where they are deployed, with the goal of funding more of them. Her motion notes that Skid Row has only one dedicated animal officer, and she wants field enforcement coverage overnight as well as during the day.

“That coverage needs to be enough to cover the 470 square miles of Los Angeles, not just during the daytime, but throughout the whole day,” the motion reads. The department's field officers handle neglect and abuse cases, stray and dangerous animals, bites, illegal breeding and efforts to reunite lost pets with their owners.

Spay and Neuter as Prevention

Rodriguez's third motion was framed as an opening for the next budget: more money for the city's spay-and-neuter program. She said she and Councilwoman Ysabel Jurado, who represents downtown, are also working to bring back a mobile spay-and-neuter program for Skid Row.

“We will always struggle to get a hold on our shelter conditions when we are not preventing widespread breeding of cats and dogs,” Rodriguez said. “Investing in prevention is always the most cost-effective solution that we have.”

The city budgeted $6.5 million for the program in fiscal 2026-27, up $1.75 million from $4.75 million the year before, and an Animal Services report projected the increase would pay for about 8,000 more sterilizations, City News Service reported. Westside Current, citing a 2025 city report, said free certificates for adopted animals reimburse vets $120 for a cat, $195 for a dog and $125 for a rabbit, while discount coupons cover $30 toward a cat and $50 toward a dog or rabbit.

What the Audit Found

The votes follow the controller's 91-page performance audit, released Oct. 21, which concluded that the department is too under-resourced to both provide humane care and meet the city's 90% “save rate” goal. The system has 737 dog kennels and 340 cat kennels. From fiscal 2021 through 2025, the audit found, the daily dog population averaged 35% over capacity and the cat population 131% over, with peaks in 2023 and 2024 reaching double capacity for dogs and four times capacity for cats.

The audit, as summarized by MyNewsLA, found the department assigned 75 day-shift animal care workers when kennel capacity called for at least 90, and at least 185 during peak crowding. The city has paid $15.8 million in liability claims tied to Animal Services cases. Unlike Long Beach, San Jose and San Diego County, Los Angeles accepts owner-surrendered animals regardless of space, and the audit recommended a policy limiting those surrenders.

Animal Services spokeswoman Agnes Sibal said at the time that the department agreed with many of the findings and that several changes were already planned or built into its 2026-27 goals.

What Comes Next

Housing and animal services officials have 90 days to return with their pet housing recommendations, and Rodriguez's staffing and spay-and-neuter requests will be weighed as the city builds its next budget. That process will unfold as Mayor-elect Nithya Raman prepares to take office Dec. 14, LAist reported; the council approves the city budget.

Original reporting by The Los Angeles Herald, drawing on City News Service via MyNewsLA, Westside Current, the L.A. City Controller and LAist, as linked above.