Difficult situations at the Indianapolis Animal Care Services shelter intake are part of the job. But Dayna Warren, who worked in intake for three years, noticed a disturbing trend.

Female dogs were dumped at the shelter heavily pregnant or even as they were giving birth. Litters of puppies were relinquished in such poor conditition that they had to be euthanized.

One day Warren recalled, a female dog and her puppies arrived after IACS confiscated them. The owner came to be reunited with them and when she was told there would be a reclaim fine, she agreed to pay but she had a request first.

“She asked if she could just get one of them real quick, so she could sell it in the parking lot to be able to get them all,” said Warren, who now works in the medical department. 

Backyard breeding, where people breed dogs without the experience or knowledge to do so safely and responsibly, often lies behind such sad tales. The prevalence of backyard breeding has led Indianapolis to face an “animal welfare crisis,” Chris Roberson, a volunteer at Indianapolis Animal Care Services, said. 

For the past six months, Roberson has been working with city-county counselors to find a solution. On Monday, the council introduced a proposal that would create a registry for dogs who aren’t spayed or neutered as the first step in legislating this issue.

If a dog owner isn’t a commercial breeder or dog broker, they have to report any litters of puppies within two weeks of birth. The litter will receive a litter ID, which the owner must pass on if they sell or give away the puppies. 

“The conditions these dogs are kept in are horrendous. It’s inhumane, the way a lot of them are being forced to live because there’s nothing that regulates it,” Warren said. “Hopefully, in the future, the only people who will be making money from dogs are people who actually care about them.”

What does the ordinance address?

Backyard breeders are creating more dogs than the city can handle. Dogs are dumped at overwhelmed shelters or are left on the street where the unvaccinated and unsocialized animals may attack people.

“It’s just a really unsustainable situation for the city,” Roberson said.

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Owners who choose not to spay or neuter their dogs will have to register them annually. The registration requires an annual veterinary exam, and female dogs can’t have more than one litter every 18 months or six litters overall. All dog and cat owners also must get their pets microchipped before they reach three months old, including puppies with litter IDs.

The ordinance focuses on education and outreach, Roberson said, so a first violation means IACS will reach out to owners. A second violation results in a $50 fine, which can be voided if owners schedule spay or neutering within 30 days, and a third violation leads to a $150 fine.

“The population of dogs is just kind of blown out of control,” Roberson said. “It’s caused that root problem that then percolates into all these other sort of issues, about the shelter being overwhelmed, and the public safety and public health concerns, etc.”

The ordinance’s authors looked at similar legislation around the country. While there’s no identical ordinance, Indiana cities like Bloomington and Fort Wayne have passed similar laws. Other cities that have passed similar laws have seen decreasing numbers of backyard-bred dogs after legislation was passed, said animal control officer Michael Stockton.

State law recently prevented Indiana cities from banning the sale of dogs at pet stores, which legislators said would increase transparency around adoption. However, many of these ordinances aimed to prevent puppy mills and increase shelter adoptions. 

The new state law nullified a previous Indianapolis ordinance, which made it illegal for a pet store to sell dogs, cats and rabbits unless they were from a shelter or other rescue organization. It also ended a similar ban in Carmel.

While there’s always a concern that another state law could overturn this new ordinance, Roberson said the ordinance purposefully excludes commercial breeders and brokers, who are regulated by state law.

“By definition, it’s a very underground, unregulated practice, so we really don’t think that the state would preempt this,” Roberson said. “Honestly, to the extent that the state wanted to regulate backyard breeding, I think that would be an improvement.”

What comes next?

Ordinance authors stressed that this is the first part of a long-term solution — and with animal shelters struggling, enforcement is unclear.

The ordinance won’t end backyard breeding overnight, but Roberson said that even a 25% decrease in the practice would be significant.

“Part of it is shifting the community’s mindset in terms of where they’re buying dogs from, to the extent we can somewhat stigmatize backyard breeding and help the community understand that buying dogs from backyard breeders is not a good thing to do, for so many reasons,” Roberson said.

At the same July 8 meeting, councilors introduced a resolution formally updating the location for a new animal care shelter at 5001 E. Raymond St.

For years now, Indianapolis Animal Care Services has been facing overcrowding issues. The building wasn’t meant to house animals long-term, and there aren’t enough kennels for the shelter’s dogs: there are currently more than 100 dogs without permanent kennels, IACS deputy director Kelly Diamond said.

The organization called the situation “dire” on social media in 2022: as of May, 3,655 animals have been brought in and only 1,029 have been adopted.

“Our city’s overwhelmed with already-existing large numbers of dogs, and we’re simply just drowning,” Diamond said. “We’re just trying to tackle the causes.”

The backyard breeding ordinance now heads to the Metropolitan and Economic Development Committee for a hearing July 15. Roberson also hopes the council will send more funding to the shelter in this year’s budget.

In the meantime, if people suspect someone near them is mistreating dogs or participating in backyard breeding, they can call animal welfare organizations Friends of Indianapolis Dogs Outside or Street Outreach Animal Response.

Animal welfare is tied to backyard breeding: fix one and you fix the other, Stockton said. He hopes to see improvement from the ordinance within a year or two, which would line up perfectly with the new shelter.

Contact IndyStar politics Pulliam fellow Nadia Scharf at nscharf@indystar.com or follow her on Twitter @nadiaascharf.