Inglewood, CA Animal Ordinances: Wildlife Feeding (2026)

Section 4-17, adopted by Ordinance 2435 in 1983, bans feeding or 'in any manner' providing food to a nondomesticated rodent or nondomesticated mammalian predator anywhere in the City. The section defines 'rodent' for its own purposes to expressly include coyote, raccoon, fox, and opossum, folding the coyotes and other predators that trigger the most neighborhood complaints into the same ban that covers rats and other true rodents. Two narrow exceptions exist. First, the owner of such an animal may feed it if the animal is kept under a valid certificate or permit issued by the State of California Department of Fish and Game.

Second, a person may feed a trapped, injured, or unweaned nondomesticated rodent or predator, but only in the window between when animal control or its designated agent is notified and when that agency picks the animal up; the exception ends the moment the notification-to-pickup window closes. Every other act of feeding, whether scattering food for a backyard raccoon, leaving pet food out that draws opossums, or intentionally baiting a coyote, falls outside both exceptions and is a violation. The section carries its own graduated fine schedule rather than relying on Chapter 4's general infraction rule: violations are charged as an infraction with fines capped at $50 for a first offense, $100 for a second offense within one year, and $250 for each additional offense within that same year, so repeat feeders face steadily rising exposure rather than a flat penalty.