I read LA Times columnist Meghan Daum's Saturday op-ed titled "Doggy gentrification" with particular interest as Daum, who lives in Echo Park, was writing about dogs and values in the neighborhood. She even touched on a dog I have written about in Chicken Corner -- "Hubble," who once was called "Trouble." (And it's true, he was renamed in order to make him seem more appealing to potential adoptive humans. He's still "looking" for a family.)

Daum justly praises the Echo Park Animal Alliance for its services and the passion of its members/participants. And she rightly calls the Alliance's list serve on a tone of superiority in regards to people who are not up to speed in animal-rescue-know-how. But I take exception to the implication in Daum's article that wandering dogs are usually the pets of working-class Latinos.

Daum says that when she reads the Echo Park Animal Alliance list serve,

Issues of race or class are never mentioned outright, but the postings are often filled with enraged chatter about who needs to be "educated" about proper pet care. And what everyone knows but won't say out loud is that nearly every member of the rescue group is middle class and white and nearly every negligent owner they "monitor" is poor or working class — and probably Latino.

It may be true that Alliance members are mostly white and middle class. But in my experience, wandering dogs have been the pets of this same group -- and to a disproportionate degree. Without a doubt some of the wanderers in the hood belong to working-class Latino families. But most of the loose dogs I have known over 12 years of living in the neighborhood come from a different socio-economic background. Most of the unleashed dogs are harmless, but not all.

Points in case:

My friend Paul is white, in his mid-thirties. He is from Boston originally, and he went to Wesleyan. For years, Paul's dogs have run loose (though now, with only one dog, the situation is less chaotic.) One of his dogs, Oscar, a rottweiler mix, used to sleep in the street and behaved erratically toward some of the neighbors. I happen to adore Oscar, and it was never bothered much by his being loose, but another of Paul's dogs put a severe strain on a friendship (with Paul) I care about. She was a pit-mix, who was sweet with people but attacked pets of neighbors and passersby. She was an escape artist, who turned up in my own yard on more than one occasion. (I have four cats, and, call me a negligent guardian, three of them go outside.) She killed the cat of a friend of mine.

One of my absolute favorite dogs in the neighborhood is Lucy. She is owned by Joe and Heather, who are white boho arts types. Lucy the dog is part wolf, with one ear permanently flopped down. Giant and fluffy, she roams the neighborhood freely. For a while she used to greet an elderly woman at the busstop every day (she knew what time to be there) and then escort her home. In the evenings, Joe and Heather often get into their car and go looking for Lucy. They know her regular haunts. Occasionally, Lucy spends the night at the home of one of her human friends and returns the next day. Unlike many wolf-mixes (who are known to be unpredictable in their behavior) Lucy has a calm, steady temperament. She may look big and scary, but she's not going to charge at you.

Bosco the dog also roams free. Frequently he follows my dog and me to Elysian Park, where he accompanies us for a while -- until he meets a dog-human team more interesting. Bosco is owned by a man who is said to be the general manager of a large Spanish-language TV station. His wife is white. Their house is large, well-kept and expensive looking. Sometimes they walk Bosco, but they do not appear to try to keep him from roaming.

Frequently I see a white and tan husky in the park or on the street alone. The husky has a beautiful gait. For a while I wondered if he was a stray who had found a good food source, but I met his owner, who is white and boho-looking, when the husky was actually being walked one day.

I lived on Sargent Place for over four years. It's one of the most solidly "educated" and middle class streets in the neighborhood. It's tidy, neighborly, and there were dogs running loose in the street all the time. Next door to me lived a superstar artist whose dogs routinely lazed around the street. There also used to be a wonderful mail man, Ron, who had bright orange-dyed hair and who was the only mail man I ever saw with dogs placidly following along behind him -- because they liked him.

And, of course, there is the pitbull whose white cell-phone-lady owner blithely let the unleashed dog charge at me in Elysian Park.

Meanwhile, around the corner from me I have neighbors who look like Latino gangbangers. They have a distinctive-looking pitbull who is almost all white with a black "saddle patch." Their dog is always leashed when out of the yard.

Yesterday, a Latino man named Albert, who looks to be in his late 40s and who was raised in the neighborhood, was telling my aforementioned friend Paul and me stories of wandering pets. He had tales of legendary canines with names like Barney-public, roamers of the neighborhood, unknown so far to me.

The list could go on and on -- full of counter-examples and horror stories, too. I believe that Daum's heart and values are in the right place. But in my experience, there is no simple us and them when it comes to dog values -- or race and class relations -- in Echo Park.