WEST PARK, Fla. -- The owner of a house full of pit bulls is under attack, and his West Park neighbors said the man breeding dogs has no place in their neighborhood.

Neighbors said the situation has gotten to the point that they are afraid to leave their homes. They claim their city needs to do more to protect them.

"The smell, the barking -- you hear them all night," said next-door neighbor Maritza Garcia.

Other neighbors told Local 10 the situation on Southwest 32nd Avenue is unsafe and unbearable.

Local 10's Jeff Weinsier counted 17 dogs, most of them pit bulls, on the property. The dogs are tied and chained to every tree, front and back, at Moreno Hohai's West Park house. Others are kept in homemade runs.

Neighbors said there are even more inside the house.

"If one of them gets off, they all get into an uproar and they attack each other," said neighbor Melanie Phillips.

"Someone is going to get killed," Garcia said.

Hohai has admitted to the city he’s a breeder and running a business out of his house. He would not talk to Local 10 about his operation.

A man who said he worked at the house also refused to talk.

The newly formed city of West Park has adopted Broward County's ordinances, which state that residents can have as many dogs as they want as long as they are being taken care of.

The Broward Sheriff's Office has been there several times.

West Park can adopt its own rules, but it would have to enforce them. Commissioner Sharon Fyffe said the city can't afford to do that.

"Eventually we hope that we will," Fyffe said.

The city of West Park has been fining Hohai $50 a day for running a kennel out of his house. Those fines now total close to $20,000.

Residents want their city to do more.

“They are really not doing the best that they can. Something more needs to be done," Phillips said.

The city of West Park has placed a lien on the house for the unpaid fines.