EDITORIAL : NEUTER THIS.

FACED with a growing stray dog problem, Los Angeles City Council members want to charge pet owners up to $200 a year to keep their animals unaltered.

There is one thing clear about the proposal and typical of how City Hall works: If there is a scofflaw problem that costs money to fix, they go after the ordinary law-abiding people and jack up their fees and taxes to pay for it.

What's not clear is how high fees for pets will actually achieve the goal: getting conformity from people who now ignore licensing laws, let their dogs run free and breed and turn them loose.

Why should responsible pet owners who keep their animals on leashes or in gated yards and have no plans to breed their pets have to pay $100 for the privilege of owning an unaltered dog or cat unless there is a clear connection between them and the problem?

And why should pet owners who want to breed their animals responsibly have to pay $200 to the city?

The city has plans for the money. It wants to use it to subsidize sterilizations in hopes of reducing the number of feral cat and dogs.

Animal Regulation officials have failed to back up their claim with evidence showing that paying the fee, which is essentially a tax on those who can afford to pay it, will curtail reckless breeding. We would like to see the evidence if it exists.

Half the money raised will be earmarked to fund spaying and neutering. The remainder will probably be spent on fulfilling the other financial obligations the department is facing. That includes complying with a state law that requires the agency to keep the animals alive longer in an attempt to find the proper owner or someone who will adopt it.

If that's the case, then the fee actually would be a tax, which would be subject to a vote of city residents.

We encourage the city to find another way to fix the pet problem without robbing Fido's owner to support Fluffy's.

City Hall should understand the public is fed up with higher and higher taxes and fees.

Read our lips: City government costs too much and does too little. It's time to start solving Los Angeles' problems by slashing the cost of city government and targeting the savings for solutions to real-life urban problems like 44,000 stray dogs roaming our neighborhoods.