Dog Is Being Neglected And Animal Control Is Taking Too Long

TW // Animal neglect/abuse

Location: California

I live in an area where crime is high and the police department won't attend to more "petty" matters. I have neighbors who have a dog that lives outside 24/7. She's a nice dog, but the family won't interact with her and the kids treat her poorly without consequences. She also lives in a fairly gross environment (no one cleaning up after her, messed up coat and undercoat, weeds and foxtails, etc.). At first there was a problem with the dog barking at nothing in the late hours of night and my mom, along with a couple other neighbors, put in a complaint with Animal Control. AC is backed up and is taking too long to respond to that.

Recently, the dog has begun to walk on three legs and refuses to put weight on one of her front feet. The neighbors did two vet visits and called it a day, but she's still in pain. So much so that instead of barking, she's now moaning/howling in pain all day and night. We haven't seen the vet come out in weeks and she's absolutely miserable.

There's an active neglect case going on, but AC is so backed up with other cases that they can't do anything, especially since the next step is to make contact with the owners, which has not happened.

Between the lack of response from police and Animal Control, I'm at a loss for what to do to get that dog out of that house. She's miserable and she's writhing in pain. My family want me to stay out of it because of how problematic the neighbors are (this is not our only problem with them), but I can't just stand there and do nothing.

Is there anything I can do to help with the situation? How can we accelerate the Animal Control case?