Palm Springs resident Brando Grandjean was immediately suspicious when he received a letter from a company warning him that if he did not get his two cats licensed, they could be taken away. I got this letter out of the blue so I called the Riverside County Department of Animal Services and they confirmed that it was a scam, Grandjean said Tuesday. The letter from We Care Foundation Inc. identified the company as an independent investigator working on behalf of the Department of Animal Services and that it was required to make a visit to Grandjean’s home. It also instructed him to send a $25 filing fee to a post office box.
The Department of Animal Services has received numerous calls about the letter, said spokesman John Welsh. He said pet owners shouldn’t send money to the company. The first red flag should be that the address is a post office box, Welsh said. The government has specific addresses, not post office boxes. The contact number in the letter is in Seattle, again a sign that the letter didn’t come from the county. Cats are not required to be licensed and registered in Riverside County; Long Beach is the only city in California with a cat-licensing requirement.
Welsh said pet owners shouldn’t send money to the company. Because the letter constitutes mail fraud, the county is working with the Palm Springs Police Department and the United States Postal Service.Unfortunately when it comes to animals, people are so giving and they are quick to write a check to organizations that help save animals,Welsh said. That is when people like the ones behind this scam take advantage of good people and their goodwill.
