AUGUSTA – State officials say they can’t afford to enforce a law requiring them to track animal cruelty cases despite what some believe to be escalating incidents of animal abuse in Maine.

The Legislature passed a law in 2001 directing all cases of animal abuse be reported to the Maine Department of Agriculture’s Animal Welfare Division. But Deputy Commissioner Ned Porter said the agency wasn’t forcing animal control officers and humane agents to report the cases because of the department’s limited staffing and resources.

“The program is in transition,” Porter said, admitting his department has no clear sense of how serious the problem of animal cruelty is in Maine.

Recently made aware of the situation, representatives of the Virginia-based People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals are now urging the incoming Maine Legislature to review its priorities and adequately fund the state’s animal abuse reporting law.

“Actually, we’re impressed by this law because it is a tough law,” said Daphna Nachminovitch, manager of PETA’s domestic animal issues division. “But if it’s going to work, it has to be enforced – otherwise why have it on the books?”

Scrutiny of the state’s animal welfare program comes at a time when each week seems to bring another instance of violence against pets and livestock.

Among the worst cases, a female horse was sexually assaulted with a foreign object at the University of Maine research farm in August. Despite a $1,000 reward, no arrests have been made.

In another case, an Orrington man faces a Dec. 20 arraignment on animal cruelty charges after four horses in his care were discovered suffering from starvation and dehydration. The condition of one of the animals had deteriorated to the point that a veterinarian was forced to euthanize it.

And despite a $1,500 reward posted by the U.S. Humane Society, no arrests have been made in a bloody Nov. 6 assault on 13 dairy cows in Norridgewock. All of the animals were stabbed with a heavy-bladed knife and one was so badly injured it had to be destroyed.

“This has been disgusting and dairy farmers are just outraged at this type of violence,” said Jon Olson, of the Maine Farm Bureau. “Beyond the outrage of the act itself, these are animals from which farmers make their living and they go out of their way to take excellent care of them.”

Even the ethics of those entrusted with caring for sick animals has been recently called into question after a Lebanon veterinarian had his license suspended for six months for mistreating dogs at his shelter. In addition to the suspension, the state Board of Veterinary Medicine ordered Dr. John Carmody to undergo a psychological evaluation after he admitted he had injured or beaten dogs under his care on four occasions between 1997 and 2002.

“We’ve had reports about bad vets, but we’d like to see cruelty charges filed against Carmody,” said Nachminovitch of PETA. “There’s absolutely no excuse for that behavior. And there was never any real display of remorse on his part.”

Peter Mosher, director of the Agriculture Department’s Office of Natural, Agricultural and Rural Resources, said he believes animal cruelty cases are receiving more media attention than in the past and that reporting also is probably up. But whether that actually amounts to an increase in animal abuse remains unclear to Mosher since he hasn’t required enforcement agents to file reports with the state because of the staffing shortages.

“One of the primary issues is the budget,” he explained. “To add on people, you need to add on dollars and come up with a budget to expand the services of the program. We want to respond and we need to be able to respond. The [officers] are not reporting and we know there are a lot of problems out there. I know they’re supposed to report, but I haven’t pushed it. The reason is that I’ve had so many other things to try to get under control that it hasn’t been a major thing in terms of priority and it hasn’t come up on my radar screen. But we’ve got to change this program and get the funding we need.”

In addition to coping with budget constraints, Mosher also has to deal with conflicting opinions among animal control officers, some of whom feel they should be reporting to a law enforcement agency rather than the agriculture department.

Bruce Savoy, director of the Maine Animal Control Association, is also a policeman for the town of Old Orchard Beach. As a law enforcement officer, Savoy said there are real problems with requiring animal control officers to submit what could potentially become information for a criminal case to a non-law enforcement agency like the agriculture department’s animal welfare program.

Before the state can hope to compile a valuable and reliable data base on instances of animal cruelty, Savoy said the Legislature must expand the authority and training for animal control officers who are sometimes confronted by dangerous animals and their owners.

He said many animal control officers are not even empowered to serve a civil summons for animal abuse in their communities.

“I’m not necessarily saying that they need weapons, but let’s face it, sooner or later – and I hope to God it doesn’t happen – one of these agents is going to go and investigate a cruelty case and someone’s going to get killed,” he said.

Savoy said his group would be submitting a bill to the Legislature next year in an attempt to increase the authority of animal control officers and persuade the state to get serious about animal cruelty.

“The answer is that Maine needs to get its humane agents certified as law enforcement agents and then enforce the animal welfare laws in this state,” he said.