The claws were out yesterday at a City Council hearing where a Queens legislator and a top Health Department official went at it like cats and dogs over a bill to register animal abusers.

The bill would require anyone convicted of animal cruelty to register with the city, generating a list that would be used to stop them from acquiring any pets for at least five years.

Those who skip the process could be jailed for up to a year and fined $1,000.

Deputy Health Commissioner Dan Kass lauded the bill’s goal, but said his agency wasn’t equipped for such an undertaking both for financial reasons and because it doesn’t have law-enforcement capabilities.

“I’m not suggesting it’s not an important effort to make,” said Kass.

“What I am suggesting is that to ask someone with a conviction for animal cruelty to voluntarily approach this department, show up every year for an interview, name themselves, is not an effective way to establish a criminal registry.”

And since the council only has the power to regulate animal shelters, Kass said it would be a “burden” on them and ”ineffective” when it came to pet shops and other places where animals are sold or adopted.

Those turned out to be fighting words.

“I’m outraged by the tone of your testimony,” fired back Councilman Peter Vallone Jr. (D-Queens), the bill’s sponsor and a candidate for Queens borough president.

“This isn’t a burden. If you love animals, having a list of animal abusers is not a burden, it’s a gift.”

In fact, he said the animal abuser registry is modeled on those for sex and gun offenders.

Vallone accused the Health Department of just not caring about animals.

As evidence, he cited the 10-year delay in establishing a Dangerous Dog Board to advise the agency on animal issues.

“Excuse us, you still owe us an appointment to that,” responded Kass, who defended his agency and noted that spending on the Animal Care & Control division would reach nearly $13 million in 2015, up 77 percent in four years.

Marilyn Teres, of the New York Ped-I-Care adoption group, applauded Vallone’s bill as “fabulous.”

“Any animal organization you call is going to be all for it,” she said.

Vallone said he plans to make “minor adjustments” and move the bill quickly.

It would take effect 240 days after being signed into law by Mayor Bloomberg. Council Speaker Christine Quinn, who has frosty relationship with Vallone, embraced the bill’s objective, but didn’t commit to passing it.

dseifman@nypost.com